Preamble

The House met at Half past Two o'Clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — TRANSPORT

New Road, Durham

Mr. Grey: asked the Minister of Transport if he has any further statement to make on the question of the new road through the City of Durham.

The Minister of Transport (Mr. Barnes): My hon. Friend will be aware that the object here is to arrive at a scheme acceptable to the two councils concerned and to myself. The county council are ready to consider any scheme put forward by the city council which I accept as sound. Some months ago the city council did submit a scheme to my divisional road engineer, who raised questions on it to which he is awaiting answers.

Mr. Grey: Is the Minister aware of the urgent need of the new road and will he place a time limit upon the two authorities to come to agreement?

Mr. Barnes: I do not quite think that the two authorities would accept the placing of a time limit on their consideration. I realise the need to get this scheme settled and I will do what I can to promote agreement.

Mr. Henry Strauss: Is the scheme which the right hon. Gentleman contemplates one that has been approved, or one that has been condemned, by Dr. Thomas Sharp, the distinguished town planner, who has made a particular study of the problems of Durham and knows and loves that city?

Mr. Barnes: I do not know whether the scheme which the city council has submitted is that to which the hon. and learned Member is referring; but that is

the scheme which I have under consideration.

Road and Bridge Tolls

Mr. Shepherd: asked the Minister of Transport the number of toll bridges and roads now operating under the nationalised transport system; and if he will give the number of roads and bridges under this control which have been freed from toll since nationalisation.

Mr. Barnes: The answer to the first part of the Question is 10 toll bridges and two toll roads: the answer to the second part is "None."

Mr. Shepherd: Does not the Minister feel that it is disgraceful that the State should take over these undertakings and perpetuate road and bridge tolls? Are the public to get nothing out of nationalisation but higher fares?

Mr. Barnes: I do not consider that it is a disgraceful state of affairs. The hon. Member will recollect that the Chancellor of the Exchequer indicated some time ago some of the directions in which economy should be attained, and this was one that he specifically mentioned. That being so, I am unable at present to make any grant in that direction.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: asked the Minister of Transport if he will make a further statement about the freeing of Lymington toll bridge, consequent upon the negotiation between the Hampshire County Council and the Railway Executive.

Mr. Barnes: I am informed by the British Transport Commission that there have been no recent negotiations between the Railway Executive and the Hampshire County Council for the freeing of Lymington toll bridge. Grants towards the cost of extinguishing tolls cannot be made at present, but I propose to consult the British Transport Commission and the Hampshire County Council as to whether it would be practicable to arrive at a settlement which could be implemented when such grants again become available.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: In view of such grants being available, may I ask is the Minister aware that the Railway Executive have said they have no statutory authority to free such tolls and is not this another case


where the public are being penalised in order that the losses of the Railway Executive can be minimised? Will the right hon. Gentleman take action about it?

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir, I do not think that conclusion is correct. I can understand that possibly there has been no anxiety to proceed with these negotiations because both bodies are aware that at the moment I cannot make a grant. That was the reason why, in my reply, I said that I would bring them together to see if they can agree, so that when grants are available there will be no further delay.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: Following that further information, will the Minister say when these grants will be made available because, on his own statement, until they are available nothing can be done? Will he give us some idea of the time limit?

Mr. Barnes: As the hon. and gallant Member is aware, my Departmental Vote is granted year by year, and I cannot anticipate what my Vote will be in the future.

Sir Peter Macdonald: As legislation exists giving county councils powers to take over these toll bridges and roads, should not the question of grants go to arbitration? Surely it could be settled by a loan, a grant being given at a later date. There is no reason to hold the matter up.

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir, I do not think that the local authorities would proceed on that basis.

Driving Test

Mr. Shepherd: asked the Minister of Transport if he has considered the desirability of compelling drivers over a certain age to undergo a further driving test; and what decision he has reached.

Mr. Barnes: Yes, Sir, and my present view is that the introduction of legislation to impose such a requirement would not be justified.

Mr. Shepherd: Is the Minister not aware that, with the increasing number of cars on the roads and the lack of further road improvement facilities, driving is becoming more and more hazardous? Should there not be some safeguard of this kind?

Mr. Barnes: I am, unfortunately, aware of the increase in accidents, but I do not think that that would justify me in introducing a new series of tests for persons of a certain age, especially when the examiners' department is rather hard pressed to deal with current applications.

Accidents

Mr. Erroll: asked the Minister of Transport if he will make a statement on the increase in road accidents since the removal of petrol rationing; and the steps taken to prevent them.

Brigadier Medlicott: asked the Minister of Transport if he is aware of the increase in the number of road accidents since the removal of petrol rationing; and what measures he is taking to minimise the loss of life on the roads.

Mr. Barnes: Since the end of petrol rationing I regret that more accidents have resulted. The total road casualties in June, July and August, 1950, were 61,926 as compared with 50,449 in the corresponding period of 1949. They were, however, 4,868 less than the 1938 figure. Almost all road accidents are caused by human error and the effect of action by central and local authorities is limited. I hope in due course to give effect by legislation to certain recommendations of the late Committee on Road Safety.
I am, however, discussing with my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary whether the police can make any further contribution towards the solution of this problem, having regard to the general demand made on the time of the police and to the manpower difficulties in many police forces. In present circumstances expenditure on road improvements must be kept to a minimum, but I always endeavour to give assistance where it is shown that road conditions are causing road accidents. In the difficult circumstances I would urge the need for extreme care and courtesy by everyone on the roads.

Mr. Erroll: While the Minister is giving his attention to this matter, will he bear in mind that many of the human errors to which he refers could be avoided if the necessary road improvements were carried out, many of which would not involve much expenditure?

Mr. Barnes: Yes, Sir, I am fully aware of that, and no one regrets the need for economy in this direction more than I do.

Brigadier Medlicott: While making all allowance for all other factors, is it not a fact that bad driving is the main reason for these accidents, and as there are thousands of people who have never passed a driving test at all will the Minister look again at the whole question of imposing tests upon all who drive on the roads?

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir, I really could not allow the statement to pass in this House that the majority of the accidents are due to bad driving.

Mr. Assheton: In view of the very great anxiety which exists in the country about this matter, which, I know, the Minister fully shares, may I ask whether he has studied the special efforts which were made by the Lancashire County Police to deal with this problem?

Mr. Barnes: Yes, Sir. Those experiments were very much appreciated. As the right hon. Gentleman is aware, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and my Department take note of all these experiments and bring them to the attention of other authorities.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: Would the Minister consider following the example of Sweden and bringing in legislation to forbid the blowing of horns? This would make both the pedestrian and the motorist much more careful. Will the Minister answer this because it is a very important question.

Mr. Eric Fletcher: Will my right hon. Friend consider the desirability of some driving tests taking place at night, because the fact that a person can pass a test in day-time is no indication that he can do so at night?

Mr. Barnes: I can quite understand the desire to increase the severity of the driving test, but, as experience shows, it is not always efficiency in a driving test that matters but what happens in moments of forgetfulness or carelessness, even in the case of experienced drivers. While a test helps to establish a standard of efficiency before a person takes to the road, it would be a mistake to think that there is any short

cut to the elimination of accidents by this means.

Commander Maitland: Will the right hon. Gentleman seriously consider giving more publicity to the appalling road accident figures? That is probably the best way of getting the dangers of the road home to the people of the country.

Mr. Barnes: I should point out that since the end of the war considerable sums have been spent on publicity campaigns.

Commander Maitland: I meant publicity for the figures and not awful pictures of a lady weeping for people lost on the roads.

Mr. Barnes: As a matter of fact, the poster upon which the hon. and gallant Gentleman is commenting adversely proved to be one of the best posters we have issued on this pattern.

Miss Bacon: asked the Minister of Transport if he has any further information to add to that contained in his letter of 30th September, about the accident which occurred in Marsh Lane, Leeds, on Sunday, 17th September.

Mr. Barnes: Since this accident occurred, there have been two further similar incidents. All three suggest wilful action and are being investigated by the authorities and there is nothing can add at this stage.

Charges Schemes

Mr. Russell: asked the Minister of Transport if he will introduce amending legislation to confer on municipal boroughs and county district councils the right to lodge objections to passenger charges schemes.

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir. On the experience of the recent proceedings on the London Area Passenger Charges Scheme I consider that the scope for lodging objections is already sufficiently wide and that any extension would only lead to duplication and unnecessarily long proceedings.

Mr. Russell: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that a situation might arise in which a county council did not wish to object to a scheme but some of the municipal boroughs or district councils within the county did wish to do so?


What happens then? Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that there is a great deal of feeling among county district councils and municipal boroughs about this matter?

Mr. Barnes: I should think that there are plenty of other facilities which could be used in such a case, but if there was a sufficiently large body of opinion in any' area I should have thought that the county council ought to voice those views. I am unable to concede the point, but there should be other facilities and I will indicate to the hon. Member what they are.

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: asked the Minister of Transport whether, pending the publication of the charges scheme sent to his Department, he will consider an interim measure to ease the burden of high freight and passenger charges which bear very heavily on those living in areas remote from markets, and particularly in the Scottish Highlands and Islands.

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir. Any question of reducing the fares and rates to and from particular areas is one for the British Transport Commission and, in certain circumstances, for the Transport Tribunal.

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that it is a long time for these parts of the country to wait for this charges scheme to come out and that, in the meantime, these freight and passenger charges are bearing heavily on life there? Is he aware that there is no measure that would help life in the remote areas of the country more than reduced and equitable freight and passenger charges?

Mr. Barnes: In view of the discussions which have taken place in this House, I think that the formidable character of the charges scheme is appreciated. As I have said, the Transport Commission hope to have their charges scheme, which will be of a more general character, ready by about the middle of next year.

Sir Ronald Ross: Does not the Ministry give the Commission a statement of policy on an important question like this?

Mr. Barnes: That is a matter for the Transport Tribunal, as laid down in the Transport Act.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Will the right hon. Gentleman break his unhappy rule of silence and send some specific directions on this matter to the Transport Tribunal?

Mr. Barnes: It is not a question of breaking an unhappy rule of silence. Parliament has laid down that matters of this kind should be determined on a scheme framed by the Transport Commission and settled by the Transport Tribunal. If I went back on the directions of Parliament, hon. Members would soon be singing another tune.

Sir David Robertson: Is it not the case that a responsibility is imposed on Parliament for the well-being of the people in these remote areas, and is it not time that the Minister took some steps to deal with this serious problem, since many businesses are closing because of the high burden of rail prices?

By-pass, Kent (Cost)

Mr. Deedes: asked the Minister of Transport what has been the approximate cost to date of maintenance work on the unfinished Ashford, Kent, by-pass, on which work has been suspended; and, approximately, how much is being spent on this work each month.

Mr. Barnes: The total to date is about £20,000. The average monthly expenditure recently has been about £570.

Mr. Deedes: Is the Minister aware that he would probably save public money if he got on with the scheme and allowed it to be completed? In view of the answer which he has just given about road safety, will he have another look at the scheme, particularly in view of the fact that the Minister of Town and Country Planning is proposing to double the size of his town and that the roads, including the main coast road, are already dangerous and chaotic? Will he have another look at this?

Mr. Barnes: If looking at a scheme could solve the problem I should do it repeatedly. While this scheme ranks very high in priority it had, unfortunately, to be stopped under the general restrictions which I mentioned earlier.

Consultative Committee (Lincoln Area)

Mr. Osborne: asked the Minister of Transport what reply has been sent to the Traders' Panel, Lincoln area, in answer


to their protest of 15th September with regard to the Transport Users' Consultative Committee; and if he will divide the East Anglian area into two parts as requested.

Mr. Barnes: I have explained to the Traders' Panel the reasons why it was proposed to include Lincolnshire in the area of the Transport Users' Consultative Committee for East Anglia. Since that reply was sent, the Central Transport Consultative Committee have suggested to me that Lincolnshire would be more appropriately included in the East Midland area, and I have decided to accept this view.

Mr. Osborne: Is the right hon. Gentleman sure that this alteration will meet the wishes of the traders who complained? If the consultative committee is to do its work the area must be small or else people will not go to the meetings from such a large county.

Mr. Barnes: I should have thought that this largely meets their point of view, but it was the consultative committee for the United Kingdom to which I was referring and not to a local consultative committee. It was the United Kingdom consultative committee which made representations to me and I decided to accept its recommendations.

Foot Bridges

Mr. Gerald Williams: asked the Minister of Transport whether, in view of the unsightliness of foot bridges over the London by-passes and the fact that these bridges are little used, he will now consider scrapping them.

Mr. Barnes: Until economic circumstances permit satisfactory alternatives such as subways to be considered I prefer to retain them and to improve their appearance by cleaning and painting and their usefulness by providing guard rails and ramps where necessary.

Mr. Williams: In considering how unpopular these bridges are in the district and how very little use they are for safety purposes, will the right hon. Gentleman at least scrap those which are least used by pedestrians in every day life?

Mr. Barnes: I do not agree that they are unpopular. There may be differences

of opinion as to their effectiveness but I cannot afford to do away with anything which can assist in the problem of reducing road accidents until I have better alternatives, and a subway is too costly for me to consider it as an immediate alternative.

Mr. Keeling: Has the Minister considered extending an experiment successfully made at Osterley on the Great West Road, at a point which is especially dangerous because oncoming traffic is obscured? Railings have been put along the centre of the road to prevent people crossing at that point.

Mr. Barnes: I agree that that was a very valuable experiment. I have no doubt that if similar conditions prevail at other busy thoroughfares rails will also be introduced. Rails are being more and more extensively used for this purpose.

Trams, Wimbledon

Mr. Black: asked the Minister of Transport what date has been fixed for the replacement of the trams in The Broadway, Wimbledon, by buses.

Mr. Barnes: As announced by the London Transport Executive last July, it is expected that the tram services in Wimbledon will be replaced by buses next January.

Stevedoring Machinery, Immingham

Mr. Osborne: asked the Minister of Transport if he is aware that the stevedore machinery at Immingham is largely out of date and frequently breaks down, causing loss of trade to the port and unemployment in the district; and what plans he has for modernising the equipment and making greater use of this deep sea port.

Mr. Barnes: I understand that the only stevedoring machinery in the port of Immingham is that provided by the British Transport Commission. Any necessary modernisation of such equipment and the development of the port are matters for them.

Mr. Osborne: Is the Minister aware that there has been no new machinery in that dock for years, that the dockers are very dissatisfied because they feel that money is being spent at other ports.


while nothing is being spent there, and that they wonder if it is the policy of the right hon. Gentleman's Department to freeze out this port altogether?

Mr. Barnes: The Ministry are not responsible for any machinery which the hon. Member claims is out-of-date and obsolete, but I am informed that trade is not being diverted because of any circumstances of that kind.

Mr. H. Hynd: Can my right hon. Friend say how much compensation was paid for this out-of-date and obsolete machinery?

Mr. Barnes: No, Sir, I cannot. That was settled in a global calculation.

Mr. Osborne: Would not the Minister agree, since the dockers there feel they are not getting a square deal, that he is now responsible?

Mr. Barnes: I am not responsible. It is a matter for the B.T.C.

Blockhouse, Kidbrooke (Removal)

Mr. Steward: asked the Minister of Transport if he is aware of the many fatal road accidents which has occurred at the junction of Kidbrooke Park Road and Weigall Road, near the entrance to No. 1 Site, Royal Air Force Station, Kidbrooke, on the borders of Eltham; and if he will consider giving instructions for the dismantling of the blockhouse erected during the late war which occupies the position of a roundabout and obscures the vision of cyclists and motorists at this point, which has resulted in loss of life.

Mr. Barnes: I am aware of one fatal accident at this spot. The Greenwich Borough Council have been authorised to remove the road block and will no doubt be putting the work in hand shortly.

Pedestrian Crossings

Mr. Janner: asked the Minister of Transport if he will now clarify the regulations about the use of pedestrian crossings at road junctions by pedestrians.

Mr. Barnes: I have considered the need for amending the pedestrian crossing places regulations in conjunction with the revision of policy in relation to the provision, siting and marking of crossings

and I hope to make a statement in the near future.

Mr. Janner: In view of the serious misunderstandings that exist about the use of pedestrian crossings, if I put a Question down in a week's time will my right hon. Friend be able to give the regulations?

Mr. Barnes: I could not guarantee the period of a week, but I assure my hon. Friend that I am desperately anxious to get the largest measure of agreement on this and, as far as I can, to get the largest consensus of opinion in the House behind the new regulations.

Ferries, Scotland

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: asked the Minister of Transport whether he will introduce legislation with a view to making Highland ferries part of the highway.

Mr. Barnes: A Measure is in course of preparation to assist in bringing ferries into closer integration with the highway system.

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that it is hoped this will result in cheaper fares and a more efficient service?

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF SUPPLY

Mislaid Documents

Brigadier Medlicott: asked the Minister of Supply what disciplinary action is taken against officers of his Department who mislay confidential documents relating to the defence of the realm.

The Minister of Supply (Mr. G. R. Strauss): The disciplinary action taken would depend on the circumstances of any particular case.

Brigadier Medlicott: Having regard to what has happened since this Question was put down, can the Minister say what steps are taken when his Ministry mislays not only documents but scientists?

Contracts

Sir Waldron Smithers: asked the Minister of Supply what steps he takes to ensure that work performed for his Department is carried out efficiently; and


if he will in future put out all work done for his Department to open tender.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: Contracts are placed only with firms which have satisfied my Department of their competence to undertake the orders and there are appropriate arrangements for inspection of the work. Contracts are placed as a result of competitive tendering to the fullest extent practicable.

Sir W. Smithers: When the Minister says "to the fullest extent practicable," does he not realise that if competition is stopped, efficiency goes down and costs go up, and that Government Departments cannot do the work so well as private firms who tender competitively?

Surplus Vehicles, Germany (Sale)

Sir W. Smithers: asked the Minister of Supply why his Department sold 360 vehicles of various types in Germany at a lower price than that obtainable in this country; and what was the exact amount of the difference, including the cost of shipping.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: Stores declared surplus abroad have usually been brought home for sale only when special needs and shortages have to be met. The average cost of returning heavy vehicles from depots in Germany to auction centres at home would be about £100 each. It is impossible to calculate the amount that would have been obtained by sale in this country.

Sir W. Smithers: Even so, does not the Minister realise that if he had brought them home he could have got a better price for them, and has not the right hon. Gentleman any regard at all for the overburdened taxpayers of this country?

Mr. Strauss: It may be that if we had brought them home we would have got a better price. One could not tell that before the auction took place; it is not certain that we would have got a better price.

Zinc

Mr. John Grimston: asked the Minister of Supply (1) if, in view of his decision to reduce the rate of delivery of zinc to British consumers to approximately 75 per cent. of their 1950 intake,

he will immediately take the steps necessary to return the buying of this metal to private hands;
(2) if he will allow private consumers to buy zinc in dollar or soft currency countries and import it to supplement supplies from his Department.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: Owing to the limited amount of zinc that can be obtained in world markets at present, central purchase by my Department ensures that available supplies are distributed fairly in the national interest and that prices are not increased as a result of competitive buying by private consumers. If the hon. Member has any knowledge about additional sources of supply of zinc, I shall be glad if he will inform me.

Mr. Grimston: How does the Minister expect British industry to function when one month he says he has ample supplies of zinc and the following month he cuts consumers by 25 per cent? Why does he allow the import of manufactured zinc at fancy prices and not allow the raw zinc to be brought here and manufactured much more cheaply?

Mr. Strauss: The supplies of zinc which normally we get from Europe suddenly and unexpectedly dried up and we found ourselves at a certain stage without the zinc we required. Secondary zinc can be imported from non-dollar countries privately, but I understand that there is none available and, therefore, there is no likelihood of getting any such supplies into this country.

Mr. Grimston: I did not refer to secondary zinc but to manufactured zinc. The Minister allowed manufactured zinc to be imported but not unmanufactured zinc. Surely it is wrong to pay a manufacturing cost abroad when we can perfectly well manufacture the zinc in this country?

Mr. Strauss: I do not think so. It would depend, of course, on the type of manufactured zinc the hon. Member is talking about, but the shortage which has developed in raw zinc—in virgin zinc—would certainly not be improved in any way if private traders entered the market.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: When the Minister says there is only a limited amount of zinc, does he mean the price


the Ministry is prepared to pay or what is available in the world markets? Further, does he really mean, in relation to the known rise in the cost of all these raw materials, that the Ministry is willing to pay the increased price in relation to other raw materials?

Mr. Strauss: No, the zinc is simply not available. It is not on sale anywhere.

Copper

Mr. J. Grimston: asked the Minister of Supply what progress has been made in the negotiations to reduce the forward premium on raw copper which his Department recently imposed.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: The matter has been discussed with industry, but no alternative generally acceptable to consumers has been found. I am prepared to consider any further representations which industry may wish to make.

Mr. Grimston: Is it not up to the Minister, who has imposed this fine on manufacturers of large plant, on whom the export drive depends, to put these recommendations forward? Will he not look again at this and stop this fining?

Mr. Strauss: There is no question of fining. We say that if anyone wants to buy forward copper, which consumers in the United States are quite unable to do, a certain premium is chargeable, which is in conformity with old custom in the Metal Exchange before the war. As there is a possibility of considerable further rises in the price of the materials, it is only right that people who want to buy forward should pay some premium for the privilege.

Defence Orders

Sir T. Moore: asked the Minister of Supply what orders have been placed with Scottish Aviation, Limited, as a result of the rearmament drive approved by His Majesty's Government.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: It would be contrary to established practice to give information about armament orders placed with particular firms.

Sir T. Moore: That means nothing. Why do the Government and the Minister treat this company like a pariah amongst aircraft manufacturing units, since they have the facilities, the skill and the craftsmanship

to turn out the equal of the best? Why does the Minister do this kind of thing?

Mr. Strauss: This company is treated in the same way as any other company.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: In view of the order which the Minister has given for prefabricated plumbing units to the Scottish Aviation Company, will he give some advance orders for the 300,000 houses that are contemplated?

Mr. Strauss: I have not said anything to suggest that this firm has not received, or is not likely to receive, orders.

Mr. Leslie Hale: Is my right hon. Friend aware—if the Order Paper is to be used for these ebullitions of local patriotism—that the firm of A. V. Roe, of Chadderton, is larger, better equipped and more adequately staffed than Scottish Aviation, Ltd., and that Lancashire has more people, more brains and more money than Scotland?

Sir T. Moore: On a point of order. Must a Member be criticised for trying to ask questions on behalf of his constituents?

Mr. A. R. W. Low: asked the Minister of Supply the total value of defence orders placed with industry and Royal Ordnance factories by him in furtherance of the Government's additional Defence programme announced in August; and if he will give separate figures for each of the three Services.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: The value of defence orders actually placed and under active negotiation by my Department up to 14th October, 1950, under the recent Defence programmes announced in July and August amounts to nearly £66 million. It would not be in the national interest to disclose the value of the orders placed for each of the three Services.

Mr. Low: Is the right hon. Gentleman satisfied that he is getting on fast enough with the placing of these orders, in view of the importance of speed, which has been stressed quite recently to us by the Minister of Defence? Will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that there is no unnecessary delay?

Mr. Strauss: Yes, Sir, I think that the whole thing is moving rapidly.

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Can my right hon. Friend say whether it is due to the Defence programme that there is a growing delay in supplying steel to civilian industry?

Major Legge-Bourke: Will the Minister bear in mind the number of industries who are holding open their capacity awaiting orders from his Ministry? They have been waiting for them a long time. Will the right hon. Gentleman please speed them up?

Mr. Strauss: I am not aware of that. We have informed industry that if they have any orders, or prospect of orders, for export they should take those orders and not wait for any possible armament orders.

Atomic Energy Staff (Pay)

Mr. Blackburn: asked the Minister of Supply whether he will institute an immediate review of salary scales for research scientists and workers engaged in atomic energy projects in view of the inadequacy of the present rates.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: No, Sir. The pay of research scientists and workers in my Department is under continual review.

Mr. Blackburn: Is it not the fact that scientists and workers engaged in atomic energy, from Sir John Cockroft—£2,400 a year—downwards are earning, on average, less than half the amount that their equivalents in private industry are earning, and does not that very largely explain the fact that, 10 years after starting on the atomic energy programme, we are still not anywhere near having produced an atomic bomb ourselves and have been outstripped by the Soviet Union?

Mr. Strauss: I do not accept the contention of the hon. Member that the pay is so much less than in private industry; it simply is not true, particularly since the Chorley Committee Report has been put into application.

Mr. Blackburn: Surely the Minister will agree that Sir John Cockcroft's equivalent in private industry is earning much more than twice as much as Sir John Cockroft's £2,400 a year.

Major Guy Lloyd: Would it not be best to see that the travelling allowances are not quite sufficient to enable scientists to get as far as Leningrad?

Motorcars (Distribution)

Mr. Deedes: asked the Minister of Supply what representations have been received by his Department on the subject of the revised covenant governing the purchase of new motorcars which the industry proposes to introduce next year.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: None, Sir. I have asked the motor industry to consider ways and means of removing abuses in the distribution of new cars in the home market, including an extension of the period of the covenant. I have not yet been informed what action they propose to take.

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF WORKS

Building Licences (Clubs)

Sir Ronald Cross: asked the Minister of Works what licences he has granted for the erection and extension of Labour clubs in Haydock, Newton and Wigan; whether he will state the reasons for the grant of these licences; and whether he is prepared to grant equally liberal facilities for the improvement to public houses and other political and non-political clubs in these areas.

The Minister of Works (Mr. Stokes): Licences have been granted for the erection or extension of four Labour clubs in these areas because of structural defects or inadequacy of the former premises. Licences would have been issued in the same circumstances for any other clubs, political or non-political. If a similar need could have been shown for public houses, they would also have received licences.

Sir R. Cross: The right hon. Gentleman says that licences have been issued for the remedying of structural defects, but is it not a fact that licences totalling £21,000 have been issued for the erection of a new Labour Club at Blackbrook and that another licence has been issued for £11,500 for the erection of the Labour Club at Haydock, opposite the existing club? Are these not facts?

Mr. Stokes: I do not know about the first one—I am not briefed on it—but as far as Haydock is concerned the new building cost £8,500. Perhaps I should add, for the information of the right hon. Member, that a licence was also issued to a Conservative club.

Mrs. Braddock: Will my right hon. Friend review the whole question of issuing licences where there are difficulties of getting bricklayers to work on the housing programme in areas like this? Is he aware that there is a lot of resentment in Liverpool that a licence for £1,268,000 was issued to Lord Woolton for the building of Lewis's?

Mr. Stokes: I cannot deal with the last part of that question, because I do not know the facts, but I can assure my hon. Friend that the question of these licences is really very closely watched. Where there is a shortage of building labour or material they are not issued at all.

Mr. Sutcliffe: Since the areas concerned are all represented by Labour Members of Parliament, is not this a flagrant case of political discrimination?

Hon. Members: No.

Mr. Stokes: The question happens to refer to Labour clubs. If the House wishes to know it, a licence was issued to the Conservative Club at Newton-le-Willows and to the British Legion. If more information is required, I shall be very glad to give it.

Sir R. Cross: Can the right hon. Gentleman give instances of where he has issued licences on this sort of scale for the erection of clubs of other parties and non-political clubs?

Mr. Stokes: I am sure that I could, with notice, but not in the constituency of the right hon. Member, except for the club to which I have referred.

Departmental Staff, India (Cost)

Mr. Marples: asked the Minister of Works what is the annual cost of the salaries of his staff in India; how many people do they provide with office accommodation; and what is the annual cost of these salaries per person housed.

Mr. Stokes: The annual cost of the salaries of my staff in India, numbering 50, is £21,025, exclusive of allowances; they provide office accommodation for about 885 people. This is only one of their duties and the cost of their salaries cannot be specifically related to the number of people so housed. I hope to take an early opportunity of consulting

the High Commissioner about the services needed.

Mr. Marples: Has the right hon. Gentleman considered whether it would be cheaper to carry out this work by some alternative method, such as employing local architects and technicians?

Mr. Stokes: Yes, I have. The whole question of employment of overseas staff has been under examination since I took office and I hope to make a statement soon. It is a difficult question and one cannot come to very quick decisions. I can only say I have it under review and I hope to take the fullest advantage of modern transport.

Farm Building, Kent

Mr. Deedes: asked the Minister of Works how far the East Ashford Rural District Council was consulted by his Department before the granting of licences to the value of £2,688 for the repair of Denwood Farm, Crundale, Kent, particulars of which have already been sent to him.

Mr. Stokes: For the reasons explained to the hon. Member in a letter of 26th August, the East Ashford Rural District Council was not consulted about this case.

Mr. Deedes: Can the Minister say why the decision was taken by his Department over the heads of the local authority and why, when, on grounds of agriculture the licence had been refused, they turned to the excuse of ancient building? What excuse was there for doing that?

Mr. Stokes: The facts were explained in the letter to the hon. Member, to which I have referred. A licence was not issued for a farmhouse at all, but because the house was considered suitable for preservation as an historic building and it is desirable that it should be repaired and occupied.

Government Offices, Glasgow

Niall Macpherson: asked the Minister of Work what grounds the Royal Fine Art Commission for Scotland gave for advising him that the new Government offices in George Street, Glasgow, should be of stone of a colour not obtainable in Scotland.

Mr. Stokes: The advice given by the Royal Fine Art Commission for Scotland


was that, for the design of the building which had been decided upon, cream coloured stone was preferable to any red sandstone. The Commission gave no grounds for this view.

Mr. Macpherson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the building immediately beside this site is of red sandstone, that the building diametrically opposite is also of red sandstone and many others, and that an opportunity has been missed of giving a fillip to the Scottish freestone industry at a time when it is badly needed?

Mr. Stokes: Yes, I am aware of that, but I am a great believer in variety being the spice of life.

Mr. Hector Hughes: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in Scotland there are ample supplies of beautiful stone of other colours, including granite at Aberdeen and Peterhead, and can he say why it was not used?

Mr. Stokes: If my hon. and learned Friend will tell me where it can be found I will have a look at it, but not in connection with this building. Exhaustive inquiries were made, but it was not possible to obtain a suitable cream-coloured stone from Scottish quarries.

Mr. Rankin: Can my right hon. Friend tell me where red sandstone is produced?

Mr. Stokes: Yes, I could.

Royal Parks (Litter)

Mr. Russell: asked the Minister of Works how many persons have been prosecuted for leaving litter in the Royal Parks since 10th July, 1950; and if he is satisfied with the number and size of receptacles provided.

Mr. Stokes: There has been one prosecution since 10th July, 1950. In this case the offender refused to pick up litter deposited by her, when required to do so by a park keeper. She was fined 20s. For normal occasions I am satisfied with the number and size of the receptacles but I am making arrangements to increase their number during the weekends of the spring and summer months.

Mr. Russell: Does the answer of the right hon. Gentleman mean that less litter has been deposited in the parks, or that his Department have not been prosecuting strongly enough?

Mr. Stokes: The position is a little better. These prosecutions are not very popular. I am doing my best. It is always difficult to get proof, but I think that on the whole the situation is improving.

Mr. Keeling: Will the right hon. Gentleman make it clear that neither the absence of litter baskets nor their fulness will be considered an excuse for throwing paper down in the parks?

Mr. Stokes: I quite agree, and I am at present in course of organising an anti-litter campaign.

War Works (Removal)

Mr. Alport: asked the Minister of Works whether he will make a statement regarding the policy at present being pursued by his Department, with regard to the removal of concrete and other obstructions remaining on private land; and what steps he intends to take to ensure the speedy removal of these obstructions, or the payment of adequate compensation to the owners concerned.

Mr. Stokes: When it is in the public interest that war works should be removed from private land, it is the practice for my Department to make the necessary arrangements either directly before the de-requisitioning of the land or by a contribution to the owner in accordance with Section 52 of the Requisitioned Land and War Works Act, 1945. The work is done as quickly as possible but there are many competing claims for such plant and labour as can be made available, and I am not in a position to promise a general acceleration of the programme.

Mr. Alport: May I ask how the right hon. Gentleman defines public interest in connection with this matter?

Mr. Stokes: That must be a matter of opinion, but I can assure the hon. Member that I am in full sympathy with the intention of his Question and that I am doing my best.

Offices, Leeds

Miss Bacon: asked the Minister of Works what will be the approximate cost of the block of offices to be built in the Headrow, Leeds, for which a licence has just been issued; how long will it take to complete the building; and how many building workers will be employed.

Mr. Stokes: The approximate cost of this block of offices is £600,000, of which about one quarter was spent before the war. The licence has not yet been issued. It is estimated that 140 men will be required for two years.

Miss Bacon: Did my right hon. Friend state that this licence has not been issued, because it has already been stated in the Press that such a licence has been granted? Is he further aware of the very great difficulty we are having in Leeds in respect of building and give an assurance that such licences will not be issued while these building difficulties continue?

Mr. Stokes: There is a confusion of terms. It is true to say that, in principle, it has been agreed that the building shall be completed, but no licence to commence has been issued, and none will be issued until the building situation in Leeds has improved.

Mr. Erroll: Who will use the building when completed—the Labour Party?

Mr. Stokes: I do not yet know who will occupy it.

NATIONALISED INDUSTRIES (DIRECTORSHIPS)

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Prime Minister what are the rules governing the acceptance or retention of directorships by chairmen or other full-time members of the boards of nationalised industries.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): The practice is to require a full-time member of the board of a socialised industry to resign, or refrain from accepting, any directorship the retention of which is likely in the opinion of the Minister concerned to affect prejudicially the discharge by him of his functions.

GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS (LICENCE APPLICATIONS)

Mr. Black: asked the Prime Minister what is the annual number of licence applications at present being dealt with

by the various Government Departments estimated on the same basis as the figures given in the schedule to the Herbert Committee Report on the Work of Intermediaries.

The Prime Minister: The figures given in the report of the Committee on Intermediaries were compiled on the basis of the written evidence supplied by Government Departments in March, 1949, for the purposes of the Committee. The situation has greatly changed since then, as a result of the many subsequent relaxations of controls; but I should not feel justified in asking Departments to undertake the considerable extra work which would be involved in maintaining these returns on an up-to-date basis.

CIVIL DEFENCE AND HOME GUARD

Major Legge-Bourke: asked the Prime Minister for what reason the decision to proceed with Civil Defence recruiting at the same time leaving the Home Guard in abeyance, was taken.

The Prime Minister: In my recent broadcast to the country, I explained the reasons for which the Government decided to proceed with Civil Defence preparations and recruiting for part-time services. The Government have under consideration the question of raising a Home Guard in a future emergency, and a statement will be made as soon as possible.

Major Legge-Bourke: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that if it should ever become necessary to call up Civil Defence personnel it is highly probable that it would be necessary also to have the Home Guard in being? Will he not so delay the decision to recruit the Home Guard that there is time properly to train people commensurately with Civil Defence?

The Prime Minister: I do not think I can accept the statement of the hon. and gallant Member. It must depend on what is the kind of danger facing the country, but the question of the Home Guard is one which must be considered with the general matter of Armed Forces.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (PRIVATE BUSINESS)

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Lord President of the Council if he will move to set up a Select Committee to consider what changes are necessary in the Rules of this House relating to Private Business.

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): Select Committees have been appointed in the past at intervals to inquire into specific matters relating to Private Bills and Private Business. The last Committee was appointed during the Session 1944–45, when the Standing Orders relating to Private Business were completely revised. I consider that no useful purpose would be served by appointing a further committee at present.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Does that answer mean that the right hon. Gentleman is satisfied with the working of the present Rules in respect of Private Business and does he recall the difficulties which arose in the summer in connection with the passing of several Bills which, although private in form, aroused public interest?

Mr. Morrison: I can only say I am never satisfied about anything, but, as near as it is possible to be satisfied, I do not think there is a sufficient case to appoint a committee at the moment. I am quite prepared to keep the matter in mind for a future occasion.

FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN

Sir W. Smithers: asked the Lord President of the Council how much art paper is being used for programmes and propaganda purposes for the Festival of Britain.

Mr. H. Morrison: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave to the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) on 17th October.

Sir W. Smithers: Is it not a fact that these requirements for advertising the Festival of Britain required about 1,600 tons of paper, which necessitated a reduction of 11 per cent. to the trade? Is the right hon. Gentleman also aware of the rising criticisms of this expenditure while the needs of the people are so acute?

Mr. Morrison: No, Sir. The hon. Member has his facts wrong.

Captain Ryder: asked the Lord President of the Council what plans are being made for the use of the Festival of Britain buildings after the Festival has ended.

Mr. H. Morrison: A number of the Festival of Britain exhibitions and other events are being held in existing buildings. At South Kensington part of a new block is being built in time for the Science Exhibition. This new block, when completed, will afterwards form part of the Science Museum. The architecture and town planning exhibition at Poplar will consist mainly of blocks of flats, schools and other buildings erected by the local authorities for the permanent use of the neighbourhood. On the South Bank, apart from the L.C.C.'s Royal Festival Hall which is permanent, the remaining buildings will have to be removed after the Festival as the site is needed for other purposes. Some, including the main structure of the Dome of Discovery, are so designed that they can be dismantled and re-erected elsewhere. Certain of the structures in the Festival Pleasure Gardens, Battersea Park, will also be retained as permanent amenities.

Captain Ryder: What are the purposes for which the South Bank is to be used? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of considerable indignation at the fact that apparently only one of the buildings there is likely to be of a permanent nature?

Mr. Morrison: As to what the site is to be used for, that is not my business. That question should be addressed to another Minister.

Captain Ryder: Would it not be possible to adapt these buildings so that they could be used to relieve living accommodation in other parts of London?

Mr. Morrison: I should not have thought so.

Mr. Bossom: What will it cost to remove these buildings and make the site available for the purposes which the Minister has indicated?

Mr. Morrison: I could not say without notice. In any case it is a site which is inevitably one for commercial development.

Mr. Bossom: Could the Minister say whether the price of this demolition was included in the estimates he has given of the cost of constructing the buildings for the exhibition?

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: asked the Lord President of the Council why His Majesty's Government have given to a particular firm the responsibility for the allocation of all advertisement space in the official programmes to be produced for the Festival of Britain.

Mr. H. Morrison: The firm was selected after careful inquiry from among the very limited number possessing the necessary organisation for doing this work in the time available. It would not have been practicable to divide the work among several firms.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: One firm was probably the right solution, but I would ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that one of the directors of this firm is the Chief Planning Officer of the Government? Does the right hon. Gentleman think it right for a contract of this nature to be given to a firm a director of which holds such a Government position?

Mr. Morrison: I did not know that but I know the Chief Planning Officer of the Government, and of all the men in the world I would acquit of any improper conduct it is the Chief Planning Officer of the Government.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: I agree with what the right hon. Gentleman has said about the person concerned, but that is not the point. It is whether it is right that a contract of this nature should be given to a firm one of the directors of which is a member of the Government in the sphere I have indicated.

Mr. Morrison: I cannot see that there is anything fatal about it. This happened to be the most appropriate firm. The choice is very limited, and had we denied ourselves the services of this firm we should have been in difficulties. I repeat, I am perfectly certain that the Chief Planning Officer of the Government is the last person in the world who would be capable of any improper conduct and unless the hon. and gallant Member can follow up these implications and innuendoes—

Hon. Members: Oh.

RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS (TREATMENT)

Mr. Edward Evans: asked the Lord President of the Council what steps are being taken by the Medical Research Council and other bodies to make available for sufferers from rheumatoid arthritis the drug cortisone, now being produced in the United States of America; and whether adequate funds to develop this research are, and will continue, to be made available to these bodies.

Mr. H. Morrison: An extensive programme of co-ordinated research on cortisone and related substances is being carried out under the auspices of the Medical Research Council and other bodies; I understand that adequate funds are available to develop the work. The question of providing cortisone for the routine treatment of patients is outside the Council's province, but I am advised that much more research is necessary before cortisone could safely be recommended for general use in rheumatoid arthritis.

Mr. Evans: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the intense anxiety of sufferers from this dread disease, and their friends, and will he do everything to encourage research and see that plenty of money is available for this very vital need?

Mr. Morrison: I am aware of the point to which my hon. Friend has drawn attention. I am sure that we have all great sympathy with the sufferers from this trouble, and I can assure my hon. Friend that I will give sympathetic consideration to anything we can do on the lines of what we are doing or additionally.

Group Captain Wilcock: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the treatment of this disease by cortisone is very much in the experimental stage, and is proving to have serious effects on patients, particularly women? In view of that fact will my right hon. Friend assure the House that this drug will not yet be made available to the public?

Mr. Morrison: There is real point in what my hon. and gallant Friend has just said. It is certainly an important consideration which we must keep in mind.

Mr. Blackburn: Is it a fact that, as reported, cortisone is being made available at drug stores in the United States


next month? Will the Lord President make sure that the Medical Research Council keeps in touch with America on this subject.

Mr. Morrison: Yes, there is no doubt about that. I do not know whether it is being made available in drug stores in the United States, but it does not follow that it should be made available here.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMANY AND AUSTRIA

Soviet Deserters

Major Tufton Beamish: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs how many members of the Soviet armed forces have deserted to the British zones in Germany and Austria since 1945, showing each year separately; how many such persons have been handed back to the Soviet authorities; how many have remained in British hands as political refugees; and if he will give an assurance that all future deserters will be treated as political refugees, unless there are over-riding security reasons.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Ernest Davies): It would not be in the public interest to disclose detailed figures of Soviet deserters. As regards the policy of His Majesty's Government, I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the Minister of State's reply of 4th July, 1949, to the right hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Stokes), of which I am sending him the text. I have nothing to add to this statement except that it applies equally to political refugees reaching the British zone of Austria.

Major Beamish: Is not the Under-Secretary aware that the forcible repatriation, during the last five years, of large numbers of Soviet officers and other ranks has meant that desertion to the Western world has largely ceased? Should not this policy be made widely known through the B.B.C.?

Mr. Davies: I cannot accept the assumption in the hon. and gallant Member's supplementary question. All I can say is that no Soviet deserters who come to the British zone are forcibly repatriated, and we have every intention of maintaining our tradition of political asylum.

Major Lloyd: Is it not a fact that although they may not be forcibly repatriated they are deported under compulsion unless they conform to certain of our rigid regulations about manual labour?

Mr. Davies: That is not a fact. If a Soviet deserter reaches a British zone he is given the choice of returning to the zone from whence he came or of staying in the British zone.

Air Commodore Harvey: As the figures are known to the Soviet Government can the Under-Secretary say how many such persons have returned?

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Why are we not allowed to know the number of Soviet citizens who come over to the British zone?

Mr. Davies: Very careful consideration has been given to this matter and we have come to the conclusion that it would not be in the public interest to disclose this information.

Hon. Members: Why?

Displaced Persons' Camps (Russian Broadcasts)

Major T. Beamish: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that Russian officers with a cinema and loudspeaker van regularly visit displaced persons' camps in the British zone of Austria and on recent occasions have made anti-British speeches to the occupants of these camps; that this practice has been severely criticised by British and Austrians and is the cause of alarm and upset among the displaced persons; whether such broadcasts are allowed in the British zone in Germany; and if he will issue immediate instructions to stop all such visits and broadcasts.

Mr. Ernest Davies: Members of the Soviet Repatriation Mission have visited displaced persons' camps in the British zone of Austria and are permitted to hold cinema shows, attendance of which is entirely voluntary. Such visits are always accompanied by a British conducting officer. There have been no anti-British speeches and His Majesty's Legation at Vienna have received no complaints, either from Austrians or from displaced persons. No visits of any sort have been made to displaced persons' camps in the


British zone of Germany since the departure of the Soviet Repatriation Mission in April last.

Major Beamish: Can the Under-Secretary say whether the British officers who accompany these Soviet officers speak fluent Russian?

Mr. Davies: I cannot reply to that without notice.

Major Beamish: Might I give the hon. Gentleman details of a recent visit?

Detained Prisoners of War, U.S.S.R.

Major Lloyd: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what reply has been received from the Soviet Government regarding the complaint that German prisoners of war are still detained in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Mr. Ernest Davies: A reply received from the Soviet Government on 2nd October made no attempt to answer the inquiries made in the note of 14th July about the numbers, welfare and whereabouts of German prisoners of war still remaining in the Soviet Union. It simply stated that the assertions were unfounded and repeated the statement issued by Tass on 5th May that all German prisoners of war had been repatriated from the Soviet Union with the exception of some 13,000 convicted or accused of war crimes.

Major Lloyd: Is not the reply of the Soviet Government similar in tone to the reply given by the Soviet Government to the Polish Government when more than 12,000 Polish officers disappeared. Is it not just as certain that many of these German prisoners have suffered the same fate as those unfortunate Polish officers? Are the British Government going to do nothing more in the matter?

Mr. Davies: The reply is, of course, considered to be quite unsatisfactory. As the hon. and gallant Member may know, the matter has been placed on the agenda of the present Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, where it will be debated.

Major Lloyd: Will the Under-Secretary see that the British Government use their influence to have put on the agenda at the same time the fate of these Polish officers? Or are His Majesty's Government not interested?

ARAB REFUGEES

Major Legge-Bourke: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what arrangements he has made or intends making with the Governments of Syria, Iraq and Jordania and others with a view to caring for Arab refugees from Israel after the International Refugee Organisation closes down.

Mr. Ernest Davies: Responsibility for the care of Palestine refugees has been vested by the General Assembly of the United Nations in the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the establishment of which was approved at last year's Session of the Assembly. It has never been the responsibility of the International Refugee Organisation. The position is not therefore affected by the closing down of that Organisation.

SCIENTIFIC OFFICER, HARWELL (ABSENCE FROM DUTY)

Mr. Erroll: (by Private Notice) asked the Minister of Supply if he has any statement to make on the disappearance of the Harwell atomic scientist, Professor Bruno Pontecorvo.

Mr. G. R. Strauss: Dr. Pontecorvo is a senior principal scientific officer at Harwell. He was granted leave of absence on 25th July last and was due to return to duty on 31st August. He had accepted an appointment at Liverpool University and was shortly about to take up this position.
Dr. Pontecorvo was born in Italy. He left that country for France in 1936 and went from France to the U.S.A. in 1940. In 1943 he became a member of the Joint Anglo-Canadian atomic energy team at Montreal and was transferred to the Ministry of Supply atomic energy organisation in January, 1946. He remained in Canada as a member of that organisation until January, 1949, when he was posted to Harwell. Dr. Pontecorvo became a naturalised British subject in March, 1948. For several years past Dr. Pontecorvo's contacts with secret work have been very limited. I have no information about Dr. Pontecorvo's present whereabouts beyond what has appeared in the Press.

Mr. Erroll: May I ask two questions? First, can the Minister state that the Professor has never had the opportunity of acquiring knowledge of atom bomb manufacture likely to be of value to a foreign power, and, second, can he explain how reliable the British screening of this person was in view of the fact that, according to the "Daily Herald," his sister is the wife of a Communist official in Italy?

Mr. Strauss: Although Dr. Pontecorvo has not had direct access, except in a very limited way, to secret subjects for some time, it would be quite impossible to say that he has not been able to gather information while he was resident in Harwell or in Canada which might be of value to an enemy. On the second point I can only say that this individual has been screened several times during the last few years by our security officers.

Mr. C. S. Taylor: When a man like this is known to have relations who are Communists—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—when it is also known that he was a bosom friend of Dr. Fuchs, why is it he is allowed to continue in such a responsible position?

Mr. Strauss: I do not agree with the hon. Member in his last allegation. I do not think it is true. As I say, this man has been screened several times, and according to the security officers the screenings were particularly satisfactory.

Mr. R. A. Butler: Would the right hon. Gentleman tell us, in view of the profound disquiet created by this news, whether, since the Fuchs episode, the whole of this screening business has been tightened up, and whether there has been any investigation since this case into all the officers concerned?

Mr. Strauss: Yes, Sir, since the episode the whole matter has been looked at very carefully and there has been a certain tightening up of the system.

Mr. Butler: Does that apply to this case in particular?

Mr. Strauss: Yes, Sir, but this man was leaving Harwell anyhow and going to Liverpool.

Sir P. Macdonald: Is not it a fact that he was leaving the country? Why was he allowed to take his family and car to Italy when it was well known that he was visiting his sister, who is the wife of a prominent Communist in Italy?

Mr. Strauss: As he was the holder of a British passport there was no means of retaining him in this country.

Mr. Blackburn: While entirely admitting the great difficulties of screening refugee scientists and welcoming the policy of the Government in accepting refugees, may I beg the Minister to bear in mind that this very distinguished scientist, as the Minister admitted, was only making £1,100 a year and that the salaries of scientists ought to be reconsidered?

Mr. Low: In replying to my right hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler) the right hon. Gentleman seemed to indicate that, because this man was shortly leaving Harwell, the new, strict precautions for screening were not taken in this case. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I may have misunderstood the right hon. Gentleman, but is it not important that this screening should have been applied because of the opportunities the man had to get to know the most detailed secrets?

Mr. Strauss: I said that more rigid screening was applied after the Fuchs case. I continued that just at that time this man took up an appointment at the Liverpool University and was not going to be at Harwell more than a few months longer at the outside.

Mr. Sutcliffe: Has the right hon. Gentleman given any indication of the reason for his leaving Harwell to take up another appointment?

Mr. Strauss: This post was offered to him; it was suggested he would be doing more useful and more remunerative work at Liverpool than at Harwell.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: In view of the fact that the right hon. Gentleman said this gentleman was due back from leave on 31st August, can he say when inquiries as to his whereabouts were set on foot?

Mr. Strauss: No, not at the moment. I am not sure when the inquiries started. I imagine quite recently, when he was overdue from his leave, but I am not certain about the exact date.

Mr. Pickthorn: When the right hon. Gentleman says that it was suggested that this scientist would be more useful at Liverpool than elsewhere, can he tell us by whom it was suggested, and to whom?

Mr. Strauss: The deputy director at Harwell was taking up an important post in Liverpool and he wanted assistants. It was suggested by the people at Harwell that this man might well go with Dr. Skinner, the deputy director, and would be useful to him at Liverpool, and he agreed to take the post.

Mr. H. Strauss: Was any investigation made of what documents the scientist took with him, since such an investigation would have been within the law?

Mr. Strauss: No, Sir, so far as I am aware no such investigation took place.

Air Commodore Harvey: Does not all this suggest that the present method of screening is completely ineffective? Will the right hon. Gentleman go into it with his colleagues and overhaul the methods of screening?

Mr. Strauss: I do not agree that it is ineffective, but we are always looking for ways to improve the system.

Wing Commander Hulbert: Can the right hon. Gentleman say if, in view of the recent incidents, he is satisfied with the present security and screening arrangements at Harwell, and how many pseudo-Communists are still there?

Mr. Strauss: I am satisfied that the screening arrangements are very good. It is never possible to be absolutely certain that anybody who may have had any connection, either himself or through his friends or his relatives, with any Communist or Fascist organisation, is working in a research establishment. We cannot be absolutely certain about that, but we believe that the screening arrangements are as good as they can possibly be devised, unless we go to limits which this House would not tolerate.

Mr. Thurtle: Can my right hon. Friend say whether the security officers have still complete faith in the loyalty of this gentleman to the British nation?

Mr. Strauss: I would like to wait a few days longer to see what happens.

Later—

Lord John Hope: On a point of order. I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent

public importance, namely, the disappearance of Professor Pontecorvo and the failure of the Government to take adequate precautions to prevent it.

Mr. Speaker: The noble Lord has asked leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely the disappearance of Professor Pontecorvo and the failure of the Government to take adequate precautions to prevent it.
The noble Lord's Motion fails on the ground of urgency in regard to this particular case. Professor Pontecorvo is not in this country, there was no particular reason for stopping him when he left the country, and the Government have no power now to get him back or deal with him.
If the remedy sought by the hon. Gentleman is to impose some kind of exit permit on any persons employed on atomic research who wish to leave this country, then the matter fails to qualify as definite. I cannot therefore allow the noble Lord's Motion.

Lord John Hope: Further to that—

Mr. Speaker: The matter cannot be argued. I have given a Ruling and that must stand.

DIVISION LIST No. 64

Mr. Bowles: May I ask a question of which I have given you Private Notice, Mr. Speaker? May I ask whether your attention has been called to the fact that the result of the Division No. 64 (Resolution on Steel) was announced by the Tellers as 300 for the Opposition, whereas the Division List in Votes and Proceedings contained only 299 names; which figure prevails, and whether you will give a Ruling as to the procedure to be followed which will not alter the indulgence allowed to invalid Members that their Whips may vote for them provided they are in the precincts?

Mr. Speaker: I am informed that in the Division No. 64 on Tuesday, 19th September, on the Motion entitled "Steel Nationalisation Act (Immediate Operation)," the Opposition Whip, passing through the Aye Lobby, gave the name of the Hon. Richard Wood to the Tellers


at the door but omitted to do so to the Division Clerk concerned. The result was that when the Tellers announced the numbers as Ayes, 300; Noes, 306, the list of names voting Aye which was sent to the printers did not contain the name of the hon. Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) and totalled only 299. An Erratum to put this right was published at the earliest opportunity, namely, Thursday, 28th September, and repeated in the usual way as an Erratum at the foot of the next Division List after the Division which took place on 18th October, 1950. I may add that the numbers given me by the Tellers are the operative ones and the others are purely secondary.
I do not think that these facts require any change in the time-honoured procedure and practice by which the Whips in charge of the Ayes or the Noes give the names both to Clerks and to Tellers of any of their party Members who, owing to any disability, are excused from passing through the Lobby although present in the House and desirous of voting.

SUPPLIES AND SERVICES (TRANSITIONAL POWERS) ACT

3.40 p.m.

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under section eight of the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945, praying that the said Act, which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one.

Captain Crookshank: Before the right hon. Gentleman addresses the House it would be of convenience to us if we could have either your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, or the suggestions of the Government, about how it is proposed to carry on this Debate.

Mr. Morrison: I had intended to deal with that point at the beginning of my observations. As the House is aware, there are six Motions on the Order Paper for Addresses relating to the continuance for one year of the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945, and the various Defence Regulations. I would propose, with the permission of the House and of you, Sir, to deal with the whole ground in my opening speech, because I think that it would help the House if at the beginning we have a short general Debate. [An HON. MEMBER: "Short?"] It is within the will of the House. I was hoping that it might finish round about 7 o'clock or so, but it is a matter for the House. No doubt the hon. Member who interrupts is staking his claim to be called, and it will be a wonder if he is not.
I thought that this might be a useful course, and in moving the first Motion I propose to make a general statement of the policy of the Government. After the issue of the Supplies and Services Act is dealt with, I assume that you, Mr. Speaker, will bring forward the separate Motions and those Amendments which you may decide to call. I think that would be the best course. The House would have a picture of the whole state of affairs before them as a result of what I am afraid must be the somewhat comprehensive statement that it is inevitable I should make. Thereafter, we can deal with the general issue for such time as is convenient and then come to the Amendments to strike out particular parts of subsequent Motions.

Captain Crookshank: I think that that would be a very convenient arrangement. We shall have to see how we get along, because the phrase "short Debate" is rather difficult to understand when one sees the size of the right hon. Gentleman's notes.

Mr. Morrison: I confess that I am a bit alarmed about them myself.

Mr. Pickthorn: On a point of order. I am very sorry, but I am not quite clear whether the suggestion is, subject to your Ruling, Sir, that the Motion in the name of the right hon. Gentleman should be debated, and then after that the Amendment in the name of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies).

Mr. Speaker: No. I do not propose to call that Amendment. It is a direct negative. It is declaratory, that is all. I thought that the proposal made by the Lord President would probably be convenient to both sides of the House.

Mr. Pickthorn: And then, Sir, such other Amendments as you might call individually, can be taken?

Mr. Speaker: When we have disposed of this first Motion, the next one will be moved and I shall proceed to call the Amendments.

Mr. Morrison: The Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945, received the Royal Assent on 10th December, 1945. It was to last the period of five years which brings us to 10th December of this year, and the question of its renewal for a further year now comes forward in accordance with the terms of the Act itself, together with the question of renewing various other emergency powers.
I had better give to the House an indication of the powers ending on 10th December of this year. In addition to the Defence Regulations and emergency Acts continued in force by the Supplies and Services Act, a miscellaneous collection of regulations and temporary statutes have been kept alive by the Emergency Laws (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1947. Moreover, certain enactments and regulations relating to Patents, Registered Designs and Shops, have been incorporated, in the process of amending and consolidating the law on those subjects, in the

Patents Act, 1949, the Registered Designs Act, 1949, and the Shops Act, 1950.
In all these cases the duration of the regulations and temporary statutes has been worded to bring them to an end on 10th December, of this year. The object was to secure that Parliament would have an opportunity this autumn to undertake a comprehensive review of most of the emergency powers surviving from the last war, and to take a general decision about their continuance for a further period, and that indeed is what we are doing in the course of this Debate today. We thought it right that the matter should not be dealt with piecemeal, but that the expiry of all these powers should be so arranged as to give the Government an opportunity to give an account of its stewardship, and to give both Houses an opportunity to survey the field as a whole.
The subject is a somewhat complicated one, as hon. Members will recognise, and therefore the Government thought it would be for the convenience of the House to circulate a White Paper showing the effect of the Motions which are before the House. In particular, the White Paper sets out the Defence Regulations which are continued in force by the Supplies and Services Act, since, unlike the Motions relating to the Emergency Laws Act, there is no occasion in the wording of the Motion relating to the Supplies and Services Act to set out the regulations which are thereby continued in force.
In discussions on the continuance of emergency powers dating from the period of the war, language is sometimes used which would suggest that the Government have retained power to govern by decree. There is no surviving power to make fresh Defence Regulations, nor, indeed, to revive any Defence Regulations which have been brought to an end. The Supplies and Services Act and the Emergency Laws Act did no more than continue in force a number of Defence Regulations. The Supplies and Services Act continued a limited power to make fresh regulations relating to the important subject of price control, but that power of making fresh regulations lapsed when the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act came to an end in 1946.
There is no surviving power to make fresh Defence Regulations, and, therefore, the only sphere within which Ministers


can act is the sphere of surviving Defence Regulations. Of course, it is the case that many were brought to an end at the end of the war or have been brought to an end since, which I shall explain later. Nothing further can be done as the law stands in that respect. We can only act under these surviving Defence Regulations. Therefore, the allegation that the Government are free to do anything by decree is misconceived and inaccurate. We are discussing legal powers; that is to say, powers under which a Minister can lawfully act. We are discussing these legal powers rather than the manner in which they are exercised, which, of course, is always open to debate and should be so. There are ample Parliamentary opportunities for discussing the detailed administration of emergency powers by Departments, but I hope that, in this Debate, we shall keep clear of these detailed matters and concentrate on the wider issues which are undoubtedly before the House.
I should like, in the first place, to give some account of the Government's use of these emergency powers during the last five years, and then to set out the case for the powers which we wish to continue in force for at least a further period of 12 months. It was my privilege, when holding the office of Home Secretary in the war-time Coalition Government, to arrange for a substantial revocation of Defence Regulations after the end of the war with Germany. On 9th May, 1945, I came down to the House and was pleasantly able to announce that 84 Defence (General) Regulations had been revoked entirely and another 25 in part, and that five special codes of regulations had been dispensed with. The present Government have steadily got rid of regulations as they became no longer required.
In February, 1946, 104 Defence (General) Regulations remained in force under the Supplies and Services Act. Of those 104, no fewer than 35 have been revoked, and it is proposed to revoke seven more before 10th December next. Of the 48 Defence (General) Regulations preserved under the Emergency Laws Act, 1946, no fewer than 36 out of the 48 have lapsed, or will lapse when the present Motions have been passed and the necessary Orders in Council made. Thus, only 12 regulations will be left out of the original 48 under the Emergency Laws Act, 1946.
Taking the Supplies and Services Act and the Emergency Laws Act together, the position on 10th December next will be that, out of 152 Defence (General) Regulations in existence at the beginning of 1946, 78 regulations, or rather more than half, will have gone. An analysis of the other codes of regulations would disclose a similar position.
I thought it material to mention these statistical facts, because it is sometimes asserted that this is a Government that likes hanging on to regulations, powers of control and what-not for their own sake, and I think that these factual statements have completely demolished that allegation. On the other hand, the Opposition will have to clear itself of the charge that they want to get rid of control for the sake of getting rid of it, the consequences of which would be very grave indeed. These are the facts of Government administration, and it is clear from them that the Government have abandoned powers which are no longer necessary in the public interest, and, therefore, the allegation that we are dogmatic adherents to control for control's sake is one of those political exaggerations and assertions which we need not take too seriously.
Within the field of Government we have done two things in order to keep supervision and steady watchfulness over these powers and their administration. In the first place, there is inter-departmental machinery for keeping under steady observation the need for continuing in force the various emergency powers. Then, in the particular field of economic controls, my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade and other Ministers have, over the past five years, taken pains to ensure that no unnecessary controls are kept in existence and that the remaining controls are simplified to the greatest possible extent. All these matters are kept under scrutiny by Ministers. I can, therefore, assure the House that a real watch is kept on emergency powers and on the need for their continuance. We shall jettison what we do not need, but I wish to emphasise that, equally, we shall hold firmly to those powers which are required in the national interest.
It is sometimes argued that there is inadequate Parliamentary control over the


administration of these powers and functions. I can only say that, in my view, events have abundantly justified the Government in asking and securing authority in Parliament for a continuance of the Supplies and Services Act, 1945, for five years, and I think that the Parliamentary checks are proper and appropriate in the circumstances of the case. When the Bill was introduced, the official Opposition proposed a period of two years for the duration of the Act. The Liberal Party got on the right of the Conservative Party and proposed a period of one year only. These motions and propositions have been shown to have had little appreciation of the extent to which world conditions would remain unsettled for a substantial period after the end of hostilities in 1945, because it is perfectly clear that these powers are still needed.
There have been ample opportunities for discussion of the administration of emergency powers in the last five years. In the first place, the Supplies and Services Act provided that orders made under Defence Regulations, which, I would emphasise, in the war period had not been subjected to Parliamentary scrutiny, should be laid before both Houses and made subject to negative Prayer. That was a very big move forward in the extension of Parliamentary supervision and control; that is to say, during the war, Defence Regulations could be made subject to challenge, and orders made under them were not subject to challenge, but under this Act of 1945, the orders are subject to challenge by negative Prayer.
This has meant, in addition, that these orders went before the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments, and a perusal of their proceedings and of the action taken by the House upon them shows clearly enough the useful work that has been done by the Select Committee and by the House in this field. I think everybody would wish to join in a tribute to the work of the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments which has been most valuable.
Then, again, the normal course of Parliamentary Business provides opportunities, of which Members have rightly taken advantage, for a discussion of administration in this field. Prayers have also been moved for the annulment of orders on

several occasions, which is putting it mildly because there have been a large number of Prayers—entirely within the competence of the House—and that has afforded the House an opportunity of considering the policy underlying these orders.
I should now like to turn to the general case which the Government wish to put forward for the continuance of the various emergency powers which it is proposed to keep in force under the Motions set out on the Order Paper today. The various emergency powers which were taken between 1939 and 1945 were required partly because of war and partly because of changes in our economic and social circumstances which have persisted to this day. We are now living in a different world from the pre-war world, and a certain number of powers taken in the war years are needed, I submit, to enable the administration of our country to deal with the post-war situation in which we find ourselves. In the present economic circumstances of our country to which I shall refer in greater detail later, there is an overwhelming case for the continuance of emergency powers. Indeed, the rearmament programme has now put the need for the continuance of various temporary powers beyond all question. The general circumstances in which we shall be placed, as a result of the rearmament programme, were fully set out by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State for Economic Affairs on 13th September in the course of the Defence Debate.
By the way, I am sure it would be the wish of everybody that I should congratulate my right hon. Friend on his recent promotion which will be implemented shortly as Chancellor of the Exchequer and to wish him all good fortune and success in the discharge of the wide, responsible and important duties of this office. Perhaps I may also be permitted to pause and reinforce what I said on Saturday by way of tribute to the great debt which I think the nation owes my right hon. and learned Friend the former Chancellor of the Exchequer for his courage, his initiative and his grip on economic policy which has served our country well.
I do not think it is necessary for me to go in detail again into the matter into which my right hon. Friend then went, but


I would refer to a similar experience, though within the field of defence at any rate on the face of it, in regard to the United States. The United States were somewhat more precipitate, no doubt in accordance with American traditions, in abandoning economic controls than was this country, and they got rid of emergency powers to the greatest practicable extent and as soon as they could. That, no doubt, was due to the different circumstances of the two countries, and, possibly, to their difference of tradition and, in some respects, of outlook. But it is interesting to note that the United States have now found it necessary to pass the Defence Protection Act, 1950, to enable the rearmament programme to be implemented.
Our purpose, it is true, goes wider than rearmament. Still, I would give to the House an indication of the United States' powers, and the following summary of the Act which has been approved by the United States Congress will illustrate the extent to which the United States have found themselves in need of wide emergency powers. The President under this Act—and I would ask the House to note it because these are pretty wide powers—is empowered:

(i) To order priority for defence orders and contracts and to allocate materials and other facilities to ensure their fulfilment.
(ii) To designate scarce materials and to prevent hoarding or profiteering in regard to them.
(iii) To requisition any property or facilities necessary for the national defence or for the carrying out of defence orders.
(iv) To provide financial aid or guarantee to private business where necessary to increase defence production.
(v) To control prices and wages.
(vi) To ration consumer goods at the retail level.
(vii) To initiate action for the settlement of labour disputes.
(viii) To control consumer credits and real estate construction credits.

These are pretty wide powers, and I am bound to say that, in view of the allegation often made that the great American Continent would not think of doing

the things that this Government do or of seeking the powers that this Government seek, it just shows that the American Congress and the American Government are somewhat more open to meet sense and reason on these matters than are our British Conservatives, and, apparently, our British Liberals judging by the Amendment put upon the Order Paper.

Mr. Douglas Marshall: Would the right hon. Gentleman suggest that in the powers which he has just read out would be included 58A?

Mr. Morrison: I did not say that the powers were absolutely co-terminous with ours; I said they were pretty wide and destroyed the idea that the powers sought and obtained by the United States administration are hopelessly different from those possessed by this Government, and which we seek to continue.
But apart from abnormal circumstances, such as the rearmament programme, there are a number of important powers which will be permanently required. At an appropriate time these powers will have to be considered. I freely admit that the present statutory set-up is not fully satisfactory. These Defence Regulation powers are survivals from the war. They were framed, if I remember rightly, under the Emergency Powers Act which was passed at the beginning of the war—

Mr. Pickthorn: Before the war.

Mr. Morrison: Technically, before the war and subsequent legislation. That is perfectly true. Parliament did not then define the scope of these powers except in the broadest possible terms, and the body of the legislation as well as the detail was filled in by the Defence Regulations. Our statutory powers now are derived from the Defence Regulations which happened—there was an element of deliberation about it, of course—to survive from this war-time emergency legislation. They have not been much expanded. As it happened, they pretty well filled the bill, but it is not too satisfactory that we should go on with emergency powers fortuituously derived from surviving Defence Regulations which in themselves were framed under a somewhat skeleton legislation devised for war-time purposes.
At the appropriate time, I think it will be right for Parliament to face up to


introducing permanent legislation in which will be laid down the sphere within which these regulations can be made. Parliament will have to determine the sphere and the nature of the powers within which regulations can be made, and will have to consider the matter deliberately and in a calculated way so that we have the fullest Parliamentary consideration of the matter. And at that time, whenever it may come, it will be for Parliament to determine the scope of these permanent powers and the purposes for which they are to be used.
But in the meantime we have to make a start, within the existing legislation, on the process of translating war-time controls to an appropriate peace-time form. The most notable example was the Exchange Control Act, 1947, which did transform Defence Regulation powers into a statute and into appropriate permanent Parliamentary legislation which the House did consider in detail. That gave permanent powers of exchange control similar to those powers previously contained in the Defence (Finance) Regulations, 1939.
Moreover, it is the case that the Defence Regulations are not all concerned with economic controls. They contain a great many minor, but useful, amendments to pre-war statute law and, as occasion affords, when a Department is promoting legislation, these improvements are put on the Statute Book and, steadily, we are transferring to statutory legislation former powers under Defence Regulations where the opportunity serves. This was done, for example, in the Merchant Shipping Act, 1950, which replaced Defence Regulations 45AA and 48B, and in Section 7 of the Milk (Special Designations) Act, 1949, which replaced Defence Regulation 55G. This process has been going on since 1945. It is the policy of the Government to press upon State Departments to take all available opportunities to lift minor improvements of a permanent character out of Defence Regulations and to put them on the Statute Book.
In the time at my disposal it is out of the question to undertake a detailed justification of the continuance of all the emergency provisions covered by these Motions. I propose, however, to deal with the main groups of powers which are still required. I shall refer, in the first place, to a group of regulations which provide a system for controlling resources in shipping and civil

aircraft for the purpose of ensuring that they are available for essential purposes, and, in particular, to meet the requirements of any emergency that may suddenly arise. The regulations in question are 46, 46A and 47AE, together with the requisitioning powers under 53 and 54.
The system of licensing ships under Defence Regulation 46, coupled with the requisitioning powers, enables the Ministry of Transport to meet such urgent requirements as arose not very long ago when it became suddenly necessary to increase the strength of the garrison in Hong Kong. These are not powers which impose a tight control on the day-to-day use of shipping, but, rather, reserve powers for use in an emergency, and few people would advocate their abandonment in the situation that faces us today.
The next group of powers with which I should like to deal are the general requisitioning powers, apart from ships and aircraft, and the powers to do work on land. The Regulations concerned are numbers 50, 50A, 51, 51 A, 52 and 53, with which may be coupled the powers under the Requisitioned Land and War Works Acts, 1945 to 1948, the main provisions of which are also being extended by the Motion to continue the Supplies and Services Act. There is also Defence Regulation 16, under which powers to stop up highways are granted for the limited purpose of opencast coalmining and the building of generating plant.
We are asking Parliament to extend the powers under all these Regulations for a further 12 months and to allow the further two years under the Requisitioned Land and War Works Acts, during which an opportunity of permanent acquisition is given, to run as from the end of that 12 months. These powers are needed, first, for housing those in need of homes, and are a useful and necessary adjunct to the house building programme. They are also needed in connection with the rapid extension of educational services, particularly for the purpose of providing school meals. Then again there is the opencast coal programme which cannot possibly be discontinued at present. Moreover, there are the Service Departments whose requirements are expanding and who cannot possibly be expected to decide, in the circumstances of today, what are their permanent needs.
Apart, however, from Service needs, a considerable amount of requisitioned office accommodation is held by the Ministry of Works. It was hoped that the present powers under the Requisitioned Land and War Works Acts, which would enable the requisitioned premises to be given back during the next two years, would be sufficient; but, owing to the brake put upon Government building by the need for economy in capital expenditure, these hopes are not being realised. The greater part of this accommodation will probably be given up by the end of 1952, but a substantial part will still remain.
I now come to the main economic controls which are exercised under Defence Regulations 55, which is the most important Regulation, as hon. Members familiar with if will know, and deals with the general control of industry; 55AB, price control: and 56A, control of building operations. The Government, with the support of the people of our country, have been pursuing a policy which could not be continued for a day without the presence in the background of some of the powers which we are discussing this afternoon. I shall deal with the matter under four heads, namely, the balance of payments difficulties, the use of the national resources to best advantage and full employment, fair shares and price control.
Our balance of payments difficulties are likely to be with us for a long time. It is necessary to control imports, particularly from hard currency countries, and the main instrument for this purpose, namely the Import, Export and Customs Powers (Defence) Act, 1939, is not under discussion this afternoon, because it is not due to expire this year. Other consequential steps which have to be taken in regard to importing commodities which are in short supply do depend on the emergency powers we are now debating. Softwood timber is in short supply, and, therefore, it must be allocated to best advantage. This depends on Defence Regulation 55.
Then the export drive must be continued, and while we rely on and have secured the loyal co-operation of the great majority of firms in this matter, there has to be in the background, for the recalcitrant few, the powers to decide how much of a firm's production shall be for export and how much for the home

market and, in some cases, that all of a particular manufacture, such as decorated china, must, in the ordinary way, go to export. This again, depends on Defence Regulation 55, an important and useful regulation.
Then we must ensure that the national resources are used to best advantage and that full employment is maintained. In this field the obvious example is the use of building resources which must be employed to ensure that first things come first. This depends on Defence Regulation 56A, which requires all building work, with certain exceptions, to be licensed by the Ministry of Works if the cost exceeds, a financial limit imposed by that Department. Then, again, the utility clothing scheme, which plays a part in ensuring that adequate supplies are made available to the people at large at reasonable prices, depends on the Defence Regulation powers.
Next, fair shares in respect of goods in short supply involves rationing, and we could not do without it. We could not do without the scheme of rationing at present administered by the Ministry of Food. The great majority of the powers exercised by the Ministry of Food depend in turn upon Defence Regulation 55. Another example can be seen in the shortages of raw materials which may result, and to some extent are already being experienced, as a result of the demands of rearmament and stockpiling. If these shortages become critical it might be necessary to re-impose measures for controlling distribution and use of particular commodities.
Finally there is price control and all the steps which have been taken to curb inflation. Besides the Goods and Services (Price Control) Acts, 1939 and 1943, we have to rely on the Defence (Price Control) Regulations which make a number of important amendments to those Acts and which are made under Section 2 of the Supplies and Services Act, and also on Defence Regulation 55AB of the Defence (General) Regulations.
We have felt it desirable, though with reluctance, which is understandable, to retain Defence Regulations 58A and 80B relating to the control of employment. The Essential Work Orders and the Control of Engagement Order and all other instruments made under Defence Regulation 58A were revoked some time


ago, and we have no present intention of reviving the use of this regulation. Therefore, we are not exercising powers in these respects at this time.
Since, however, it is the case that a regulation once revoked cannot be revived, we consider that as a responsible Government it would be prudent to keep the powers in existence under which orders could be made for a further period, as it is not possible at this stage to be certain that circumstances will not arise in which the use of some of these powers might be imperative. But if these powers were revived they would, of course, be open to the challenge of the House of Commons, and we can be tolerably certain that some talk would take place about it—indeed, possibly other things, too. I understand that and I quite accept that that should be possible and right.
Both sides of industry have asked for the continuance of the Conditions of Employment and National Arbitration Orders, 1940 to 1950, and that involves Defence Regulation 58AA. The Essential Work Orders prohibited employers from discharging workers in essential industries, and prohibited the workers from leaving that employment. They also secured basic standards of wages and other conditions of employment for workers in those industries. The Control of Engagement Order prohibited employers from engaging workers otherwise than through employment exchanges or other agencies authorised by the Ministry of Labour. The Registration for Employment Orders enabled the Ministry to require the registration of persons employed or seeking employment in particular industries.
Now I come to the Ministry of Supply sphere of responsibility and activity. The Ministry of Supply have wide powers, as the House knows, of buying and manufacture under Section 6 of the Supplies and Services Act, 1945, which we are continuing in force. The Ministry buys and sells centrally copper, lead, zinc, aluminium, and chrome ore. There was a debate in the House on 20th June of this year on bulk buying, particularly in relation to copper, and the reasons why it had been necessary to continue bulk buying since the war were very fully explained.
These reasons are, broadly speaking, applicable to all the five metals which the Ministry buys and sells. They can be summarised in the words, shortage and foreign exchange, particularly of course the conservation of our dollar resources by ensuring that the United Kingdom needs are met to the greatest possible extent from sterling and soft currency countries. These reasons are now reinforced by the increasing demands the world over due to the combination of a high level of industrial activity in America, the need of re-armament and stock-piling by the United States of America.
As regards the Ministry's manufacturing powers under Section 6, they have been used as authority for the manufacture of certain types of civilian goods in the Royal Ordnance Factories with the double benefit, first, of providing work for the skilled men and the plant which had in any case to be retained as part of our war potential, and secondly, by using those manufacturing resources to supplement the overloaded capacity of private industry. The other manufacturing activities of the Ministry, apart of course from manufacture for the Service Departments which is not done under the Supplies and Services Act at all, are four factories producing steel and ferro-manganese and magnesite which were kept in production after the war to augment supplies. These, I submit, are useful activities. Hon. Members opposite know that the Government have no intention of minimising what could usefully be done in this field of activity.
That is the description of the powers which we are seeking to renew, and that is the case for their renewal. It is, of course, for the Opposition to choose its own course of action. If they should propose to bring to an end these economic powers which, at any rate, since the war have been subject to Parliamentary supervision—certainly under this Government they will continue to be subject to proper Parliamentary supervision—let them say so. Indeed, the Liberal Amendment, which I presume the Leader of the Liberal Party and his friends have put down in all seriousness—

Mr. Clement Davies: Hear, hear.

Mr. Morrison: —if that were carried it would bring the whole of these powers


to an end. If they were brought to an end certain consequences would follow. If the Opposition propose, as the Liberals propose, to bring them clean to an end, they will be supporting policies, as the Liberals are doing, which would undoubtedly lead to social anarchy, unemployment and economic confusion.
I wish hon. Members of the Liberal Party would think of what they are doing. If these powers did come to an end suddenly, undoubtedly prices would be out of control, unemployment would march and our export balance of trade would be all to pieces. They cannot have thought of what they were doing. However, they have put down their Amendment and the Leader of the Liberal Party says that they meant it. If they have their way these powers will come to an end and private capitalist anarchy will come back again. That is what it means. I think it is a wild and foolish thing to do. Still, it is their funeral and not mine.
The Opposition will choose its own course. I doubt if the Conservative Opposition will have the courage to act on their real convictions, for their real convictions are the same as the Liberal Party's, backward as they are. However, I shall be followed by a spokesman of the Opposition, and we shall see. We believe these powers are necessary for the well-being of the nation. We commend them to the consideration of the House. Clearly, if these powers were not renewed the gravest consequences would follow to the economic and social well-being of our people as well as to the re-armament drive.

4.29 p.m.

Captain Crookshank: The right hon. Gentleman crammed so much into his speech that it was very hard to see the wood for the trees. While we are very much obliged to him for his description of the various regulatory powers which are at present being used and of how they are being exercised, I must point out that there are bigger problems behind the case than he allowed to appear today. The fact is that the right hon. Gentleman certainly glossed over one of the most remarkable things of all: that was, he gave no account and no explanation of how it is that this Motion is before us at all. We were led to suppose, and the country was given to understand, from the speeches which he

himself has made, that the Socialist Government, if they were returned to power, would legislate to make the powers which are referred to in this Motion permanent Statutes. There was no question of renewing them for one year. Not at all, Sir.
It is an essential basis,
said the right hon. Gentleman, speaking of the Act,
of the organisation of economic planning and control, and, therefore, we shall place a revised and permanent version of that Act on the Statute Book if we are returned to power.
But, of course, there have been some changes since 8th June, 1949; and no doubt the very definite expression of views by the electors has made the Government think it wiser to proceed by one-year instalments.
Now, I take no exception to that in this regard today, because that is to carry out exactly what my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition stated in May of this year. This is the policy we should have insisted upon having. If I may quote my right hon. Friend, in Edinburgh on 18th May he reminded his audience that the whole system of controls rested on this corpus of Regulations and Orders and Acts, and he reminded them that the right hon. Gentleman had said that this would be replaced by a permanent Measure, and then my right hon. Friend said:
I take this occasion of announcing that we should oppose the permanent extension of the Act, and insist on a continuation only on a year-to-year basis, in order to retain full Parliamentary control.
Naturally we on this side of the House, whatever we may think about the general ideas of control, are very grateful that the right hon. Gentleman has accepted my right hon. Friend's view. To that extent, we are discussing today a complete victory for the point of view which was expressed by my right hon. Friend—not only in May but in June this year—that this outrage of 1945, when the powers were taken for five years, and no general discussion allowed from year to year in this House, should come to an end. This point has been conceded.

Mr. H. Morrison: I would advise the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to read tomorrow what I have said. He may find things not quite as he is making them out to be.

Captain Crookshank: I do not know what the right hon. Gentleman did say. He comes forward today with this issue and this Motion, and I am saying that he has come forward—and he cannot contradict it—with a Motion to extend the powers for one year.

Mr. Morrison: This year.

Captain Crookshank: That is exactly what my right hon. Friend asked for in May. I am merely saying that that is the point achieved.
This is, of course, an extremely complicated subject, and I do not propose to go into it at any great length; but I must protest that, when we come to pick it up again for the first time for many years, we find that the most recent issue of the regulations is two and three-quarter years old. The latest issue one can get from the Vote Office was printed as in force in January, 1948. I think it is deplorable that Parliament should have to discuss this matter, if it wants to discuss it in detail—as I think it can on this occasion—with a document as hopelessly out of date as that. While I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for the White Paper which he kindly provided for this Debate, it is really almost stretching words to call it an Explanatory Memorandum, because it is extremely difficult to make much out of it, except that it is a list of a number of the regulations which are to be continued.
I think we can say that the issue which is raised by this Debate does show the big, fundamental gulf that there is between the two sides of the House on this issue. The right hon. Gentleman comes forward on this occasion with a one-year proposal, but we recollect so well what has been said before. He says that the Government do not want to have controls for the sake of controls; well, that may be all right if it is used as a phrase, but we all recognise, I am sure the Government themselves recognise—that the logical conclusion for a full Socialist administration and State must be government by control; and that is what they are working for, and if they do not agree I can only refer them to words of the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer, whose departure we also wish to associate ourselves with the right hon. Gentleman in regretting, and in expressing the hope that he may regain his strength. But

the ex-Chancellor pointed out in a famous book, "Problems of a Socialist Government":
The Government's first step will be to call Parliament together at the earliest moment and place before it an Emergency Powers Bill to be passed through all its stages on the first day. This Bill will be wide enough in its terms to allow all that will be immediately necessary to be done by Ministerial Orders. These Orders must be incapable of challenge in the courts.
Now, that is how the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer envisaged the functioning of a Socialist Government, and the next year he carried it still further in his next book, "Where Stands Socialism?" in which he said:
The devising of the detailed administrative methods for the working out of the plan"—
the Socialist plan—
—are not matters with which the House of Commons need concern itself.
Need not concern itself!
Ministers, with the advice of their administrative staffs and experts, should handle the detailed work. Full powers to that end should be delegated to them.
None of all that has been repudiated by the Socialist Party; and, in fact, as time goes on one sees that it must be the logical end—if they go the whole way; though, of course, they did not need in 1945, when they came into office, to take the action the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer had suggested—to pass in one day a Measure containing emergency powers—because as a fortuitious result of a war taking place, though about to come to an end, the powers were already there; and so they were able to use them and continue them.
Of course, the right hon. Gentleman, if he wanted to give us a complete picture of the history of the thing, should have pointed out that it is quite true that the 1939 Act, under which the Defence Regulations were made, was related to the prosecution of a war which was imminent. It was passed a fortnight before. It is also true that what governed at that time that general policy, and all the powers which the Executive could use, was the principal Act, in which were words as to what was, as it is called, intra vires, and, therefore, what could be challenged and what could not be challenged. Those powers were extended, because while the war regulations dealt with war problems, afterwards we got an


extension for the immediate post-war matters.
I do not want to go into the whole story, but those powers were for immediate post-war matters such as demobilisation, relieving the distress throughout the world at that time, and so on. Then in 1947 another series of aims was introduced, and the Act became part of the authority for aims which were quite different, such as promoting the productivity of commerce and, as the right hon. Gentleman says, helping the export trade, and the like. That was extending the powers outside the sphere of war. They had nothing to do with war and with the objects which had been—and had been properly—agreed by Parliament when war was imminent.
I think that the point should be made with regard to the war powers that, though we were engaged in a life and death struggle at that time, they had to be renewed each year, and from that fact it was possible to have a general discussion each year; and a discussion did take place in 1942, 1943, and 1944—and that at a time when—[An HON. MEMBER: "In 1941?"] No. I can explain that. In 1940 we had extended powers when, as will be recollected, the present Prime Minister came to the House and asked for them. They were taken for 18 months because, with the imminence of the attack, it was thought quite possible that Parliament would not be able to meet in August of that year. Therefore, they were taken for an extra long period then. That was why there was not a Debate in 1941. It was not because people did not want a Debate, but for other overwhelming reasons. There were Debates, however, in 1942, 1943 and 1944. In spite of the fact that there was a Coalition all-party Government, and that there was no Opposition in any official sense, grave matters were then discussed.
In 1945, the right hon. Gentleman scrapped all that and the powers of Debate that Parliament had on these issues during the war were taken away from the whole of the last Parliament, and we were never able fundamentally to discuss this problem. I put that in evidence against the right hon. Gentleman when he says rather soothingly today that these things are necessary. He is by repute a good Parliamentarian, and we had always thought so, but today he has

left that out of his argument altogether. He has not apparently conceded anything to the need for Debate, except that on this occasion these powers are to be renewed for only one year. To that extent he has conceded what we have so much wanted.
The trouble, which someone from Mars who had come here in a "flying saucer" would not have appreciated from listening to the right hon. Gentleman, is that it is not just a few regulations that we are discussing. There is involved in this argument a host of orders, statutory instruments, and decrees of another kind, running into thousands and thousands, which govern the detailed life of every citizen in this country. There is a whole mass of these things. It is not as if we were discussing only one or two. The right hon. Gentleman very properly picked out one or two of the more important regulations which come up, but for the ordinary citizen it involves quite a lot of other little things which affect him from day to day.
The right hon. Gentleman told us that Ministers were always carefully pruning these matters. I do not doubt that many of them are, but the fact remains that if power is delegated, delegated and delegated further down, all sorts of things happen which do not and cannot, owing to the press of business and to their number, come within the purview of Ministers. There is thus a growth of bureaucracy with ever-increasing powers, and that is one of the things to which most of us on this side of the House take exception. Just as the right hon. Gentleman, as a result of the election has had, for at any rate the time being, to recede from the proposition that the Socialist Party would make this permanent legislation and has had to make it for one year only, we can probably guess that as a result of the political situation in the House there will be a good deal less making of orders as a matter of convenience throughout Government Departments today. If a Minister can have the support of a 200 majority for any order that he brings to the House it is very likely that such an order will not be scrutinised quite so carefully as when the Minister says, "Well, you know what it is, and I do not think I want to risk this one at all." It may be that we shall get considerably fewer orders and better administration as a result. I hope so. But that does not deal with the principal issue of what is to be done today.
The other day the Minister of Transport was trying to accuse us of political dishonesty, or something akin to it. Well, there is a bit of that—one could use harsher words—when one has to discuss powers of this kind which cover so many different things, and which have either to be accepted or refused. As the right hon. Gentleman said, this is 23rd October; turn this down and what happens on 10th December? I say that the Government are very much to blame for not having gone into these matters much earlier, instead of at the last minute throwing that at us, in spite of our having won in asking that this should be enacted for only a year.
There are whole groups of controls lumped together, if I may use that phrase. There are the major controls which the right hon. Gentleman indicated, many of which are linked up with the political philosophy of the Socialist Party; it is what they want to do; they want the powers laid down in the first part of the 1947 Act for quite other reasons. Some are obviously there for the time being. The right hon. Gentleman specifically mentioned rationing. Well, I hope that even in their wildest moments the Socialist Party do not look forward to there being rationing for ever and ever, but merely say that, in order that in a time of scarcity there should be a reasonable possibility of everybody getting a fair share of what is available, rationing should continue. I hope that is their line.
There is another group which, as we shall show later on when we can pinpoint one or two in the Debate, might as well disappear altogether, but which are kept going for reasons which are quite inconclusive and unsatisfying. There is yet another group which, had it not been for dilatoriness on the part of the Government, might very well now have become part of the statute law. Again we do not particularise very much at this moment, but the Government can use, for example, the whole section which deals with the women's Armed Services. There may be a good reason for it, but I have no idea why that should not have been incorporated in the Army Act, or the instrument required for dealing with the W.R.N.S.
Other regulations, which were brought in during the war because they were

needed at that time, throw up a difficulty which has always been there. The Home Secretary, who has been so long at the Home Office, will know some of those, such as unlawful gaming parties, the registering of clubs, and so on. But there is no reason at all why, 11 years after the outbreak of war, all that should be done by temporary orders under regulations. There is a variety of things. There are the great economic controls, of which the right hon. Gentleman spoke, which are really part of the vehicle in which he wants to bring Socialism into this country. There are the temporary controls, such as rationing, which are required in times of scarcity or difficulty. There are others which ought not to be there at all, and others which ought to be part of the statute law.
It is the Government's case that, as this is 23rd October, unless all this is passed there will be chaos. I must say, speaking for myself, that I agree. I think it would be extremely irresponsible for Parliament to say today that we should scrap everything in the expectation that within six weeks the Government could pass all that was necessary to carry on what is admittedly still essential. I do not think that is possible. Even if it were, I should want to be very much persuaded by the Government that it would be safe to do so, in view of the emergence of the difficulties about Defence. After all, it is only a month ago that we had a short Session, when the House unanimously agreed that we must get on with our defence programme. Sitting here, we obviously cannot pick out—at least, I cannot; some of my hon. Friends may be able to, but certainly we have not had much time since Thurs day, and we can absolve ourselves on that ground if no other—

Mr. H. Morrison: The right hon. and gallant Gentleman ought not to say "since Thursday," because I announced earlier on, that this business was coming up.

Captain Crookshank: I agree. I was referring to the date when it appeared on the Order Paper. I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman was so quick with me. Whatever the time, it is difficult for hon. Gentlemen who sit on the Opposition benches and who have not access to the interior administrative arrangements of


Departments to be able to pick out from this huge corpus, two and three-quarter years out-of-date, exactly which of these regulations are likely to be needed for the re-armament programme. That is all that I am saying. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will agree with me on that.
We are not here in any way to jeopardise the decisions reached so unanimously less than a month ago in this House. If the Government say nothing else than that they must carry this on for another year because they have to govern and cannot guarantee the orderly progress of the re-armament programme unless they do carry it on, in spite of my first reaction of wanting to throw it all out and to say how ridiculous it is that five years after the end of the war they have to carry on with the same powers, I would have to concede to the Government that it was necessary, and probably say, in the words of the hon. Member for Gravesend (Sir R. Acland), whom I do not see in his place, when he spoke from the Liberal benches on the occasion when the Government introduced the Act on 24th August, 1939:
The Government … asks for … a Bill which contains Clauses every one of which we would be bound to oppose, and rightly oppose, in normal circumstances."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th August, 1939; Vol. 351, c. 79.]
I think that is the situation so far as rearmament is concerned. If the right hon. Gentleman asked me to tell him what my view is, and what I advise my hon. Friends to do, I would reply: that we cannot hold ourselves responsible for taking any action which, on the one hand, would possibly injure rearmament, and, on the other hand, bring about complete administrative chaos within the next six weeks in directions in which we are still convinced that it is necessary to carry on with some controls.
I do say, however, having gone so far, that I think that all parties of the House of Commons, not only those who sit on these benches but those who sit below the Gangway and those who sit opposite, ought to serve notice on the administration—I do not know what administration will be here in 12 months' time but the machinery will go on whatever the political heads—that we expect the administration to make a very firm review of these orders, rules and regulations and to say which ought to be made at once a matter

for legislation—some very important legislation, and some eminently suitable for Fridays—and which should be scrapped altogether. If there is no change at all in 12 months' time, then the House of Commons will be very critical of the administration. I think that the right hon. Gentleman brings to this House of Commons a point of view—[Interruption.] It is no use the right hon. Gentleman laughing.

Mr. H. Morrison: I was not laughing at the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. I will not tell him what I was laughing at.

Captain Crookshank: I dare say I could guess. I have gone from the point of the Opposition and the Government, and I am now on the point of the House of Commons. To have a bureaucratic administration with vague powers in the background, is obviously an easy way of governing the country through administrative action, and much easier for a large majority than for a small majority, as I said at the beginning of my remarks. Even so, all this corpus has to be looked at and has to be pruned down, and we serve notice that in our view this has to be done within the next 12 months; but because of the difficulties and dangers with which we are faced, we do not propose to vote against this Motion.

4.55 p.m.

Mr. Clement Davies: To me it is very sad to notice how little interest is taken in this matter by Members of this House. I am not speaking of any one party but of the whole House, because what is involved is the sovereignty of Parliament, its authority and power, and whether we should go on delegating that authority and power to Departments of the Government. Very little interest is being taken in this subject by Members of all parties in the House. I do not think that I have ever heard the Lord President of the Council so unreal and so facetious as he was this afternoon, when he practically dismissed the whole question of the sovereignty of Parliament as of no importance whatever. I think that the number of Parliaments in the free countries of the world has increased in recent years, but I am quite sure that the power and authority of each of those Parliaments has tended to diminish.
Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, the fight was against the Executive, to wrest power from it and to give the power to the people as represented in Parliament. That continued right down into the present century. Unfortunately—certainly during the last 30 years—the tendency has been to surrender back to the Executive powers which, at one time, had been won from them. In the main, so far as this country is concerned, undoubtedly this is due to the two World Wars in which we had to engage.
When war comes and the enemy is threatening we surrender to the Executive all those liberties which we have treasured. We surrender them to the central authority temporarily in order that they may defend those liberties. They are surrendered in trust to them so that when the enemy is defeated, those liberties may be handed back to us in full and not diminished. Unfortunately, when the war is over the tendency of Governments and executives is to hold on to those privileges which we have handed to them; so much so that the liberties which those of us who were alive on 14th August, 1914, enjoyed are not now enjoyed by the people of this country. They were not handed back to us in full at the end of that war.
So it was that this tendency grew to put into the hands of Departments the power to legislate. Not only have they the power to legislate, but they do something else as well. There is the tendency in every regulation which they make to initiate a new judicial power in themselves, and to create what was entirely alien to this country but very well known in France and in other parts of the Continent, namely, administrative law, making themselves, to a large extent, the judge in their own case, and putting themselves outside the ordinary jurisdiction of the courts of justice.
That power was increased in the 1930's, and then came the war of 1939. Once again this House surrendered its liberties into the hands of the Government of that day, so that full power to legislate was given to the Government Departments. Again, following the precedent of 1914, all that the Government of the day asked for and all that Parliament surrendered to them was temporarily limited to the duration of the war and six months afterwards. It was felt that the powers which had been given in 1939 were insufficient,

and in May, 1940, a far more comprehensive Act was passed, although limited in time—to the duration of the war and six months afterwards.
We had no hesitation in time of war in passing that legislation. Those of us who were present will recall that it took only half an hour from the moment the Bill was introduced to the time it became the law of the land. We realised that the powers were being given to the Government for the express purpose of defending our liberty, and that the freedom would be again handed back to the House in full when the war was over. What happened? It was realised, probably in 1945, as the war was coming to an end, that we could not return to a peace footing within six months, and the Government came to the conclusion that they would like the powers extended for two years. The Caretaker Government took that view, and they would have come to the House to ask for this extension had they continued in office.
When this Government came into office, however, they asked for an extension of five years—the full lifetime of the Government. The Conservatives were content to give them two years, but I, on behalf of the Liberal Party, said "No." I said that they should have another 12 months, when the Government should come back to the House to give an account of their stewardship. Then, if it were absolutely necessary, Parliament would agree to this war-time legislation being continued in time of peace. I said that the Government should explain the reasons to the House for the extension, and that the House would probably agree to it.
Because I did that, I am now accused by the right hon. Gentleman of being to the right of the Tories. I am accused of that for having dared to defend the House of Commons against the Executive. That is the attitude of the right hon. Gentleman. It is all very well for him to laugh, but in a few moments I shall give a quotation from one of his speeches to show his attitude towards the House of Commons. Of course, they got the Bill through the House with the majority they had at that time. We are now in the position, nearly five and a half years after Germany and Japan were defeated, of being asked by a Government which has already been in office for


five years to continue this wartime legislation.
Let us see how these regulations have grown. They have been turned out at the rate of roughly six a day. Statutory Instruments, which are the children of these regulations, were turned out to the extent of 2,271 in 1946, 2,916 in 1947, 2,858 in 1948 and 2,467 in 1949, and they are still going on at that rate today. The right hon. Gentleman then pats on the back the Committee of this House which scrutinises these regulations. Has he forgotten that the chairman of that Committee has said the Committee is so overwhelmed that it cannot possibly scrutinise them all properly? That is the position and all these regulations are now the law of the land. They are as much the law of the land as a Statute, and all of us are supposed to know them and understand them.
The right hon. Gentleman has criticised us for having put down this Amendment—in line 1, to leave out from "That," and to insert:
this House declines to continue in force measures which enable the Government to legislate by regulation without prior reference to Parliament of any matter affecting the economic life or freedom of the whole nation and which deprive Parliament of all opportunity to amend such legislation.
My reply is that had the Government not been so enamoured of this Act, they would have set about bringing in legislation in time and in the proper way, to deal with these matters which are still being dealt with under legislation passed for war purposes. There is a world of difference between these regulations and an Act of Parliament. Regulations are Acts of Departments—no one else—and all that can happen in the House, in spite of the right hon. Gentleman saying that they are under the control of the House, is that we can nod or shake our heads in assent or dissent, being unable to amend them or touch them in any way.
The right hon. Gentleman then compares them with Bills passed through the House. I shall refer to a quotation in a moment where it is pointed out that a Bill is the work of the whole House. Even those who oppose a Bill in principle do their best to help to make it workable, and I cannot remember a single occasion when a Bill, properly and carefully prepared by the Minister and his Department and thought to be perfect, has not been

amended from one side or the other. The right hon. Gentleman does not want that. He wants full powers, and because we have criticised him he says, "You be careful of your language," and talks about "Throwing the country back into a chaotic state." This is what the right hon. Gentleman said in Blackpool on 8th June, 1949:
The Executive and the Government have no intention that the Supplies and Services Act, 1945, shall come to an end. It is an essential basis for the organisation of economic planning and control.
"Planning and control" by whom? By the Executive without the control of Parliament; not the "planning and control" of the people through their elected representatives, but by a dictatorial Government without the authority of Parliament. He continues:
Therefore, we shall place a revised and permanent version of that Act on the Statute Book if we return to power.
I do not know what the Government wish to revise. They regarded those powers at that time as rather limited—as being required merely for war purposes—so they widely extended them in the Bill which became law on 13th August, 1947. These two Acts are so wide in their powers that, if they had been passed by the Parliament of 1628, Charles I need never have called the Short or Long Parliaments. The right hon. Gentleman is 300 years behind his time. He should have been adviser to the King in those days.
The right hon. Gentleman commends these regulations as being just as good as an Act of Parliament, but I am glad to find that the Prime Minister does not hold that view. In fact, the views expressed by the Prime Minister are such that he certainly could sign the Amendment which stands in my name and that of my hon. Friends. I would very much welcome if he did. I have not much doubt which side he would be on, and I crave his support in this matter. May I refer to the words of the Prime Minister? They are so apt, they describe the position exactly and are a complete answer to the right hon. Gentleman. They are in language which the Lord President of the Council warned me not to use. Speaking in this House on 8th March, 1937, the Prime Minister said:
This House has never been a mere assembly for registration. It has never been a mere debating society. It has never merely been a House which the Government use as an instrument of registration.


That is what we are being asked to do today:
It has never been a House to which the Government say: 'Here is our suggestion. You may take it, and say "Aye" or "No."' This House has always taken an active share in legislation. The Members have shaped legislative proposals. A Bill is brought in, it is discussed in principle, it is taken to Committee, it goes through the Report, and by the time it has been through these various stages, although it is the Government's Bill, it has been framed by the co-operation of the Members of this House. Where certain Members oppose the Bill in principle they take an active part in trying to make it workable. Therefore, every Bill that goes through the House becomes in that way the work of the whole House.
The importance of that procedure is that the experience and ideas of the Members of the House are brought into the common pool. That is the traditional British method and the democratic method. There is another method that obtains in other countries. In some countries a Dictator frames legislation and submits it to a Grand Council, but the Grand Council has no right to say anything but 'Aye' or 'No'; and it always says 'Aye.' There is a danger that this House may be turned into the equivalent of a Fascist Council… ."—[OFICIAL REPORT, 8th March, 1937; Vol. 321, c. 815–816.]
Those are the words of the Prime Minister in 1937.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: What was he talking about?

Mr. Davies: These very regulations.

Mr. Silverman: Not the same regulations?

Mr. Davies: Similar regulations brought in in exactly the same way, which meets with the approval of the Lord President of the Council.

Mr. Silverman: What was the Debate?

Mr. Davies: It was a Debate arising on Standing Order No. 19.

Mr. Silverman: Brought in by the Government?

Mr. Davies: Yes, brought in by the Government. I said there was a tendency during the 'thirties to do this kind of thing. The Prime Minister, who at that time was in Opposition, was opposing it, and he used these very words when speaking in Opposition.

Mr. Silverman: Tell us what was the occasion of that Debate? What was the subject matter?

Mr. Davies: The subject matter was the bringing in of regulations such as can be brought in under these two Acts.

Mr. Silverman: Which regulations?

Mr. Davies: I really forget the particular ones at the present moment, but it was on the principle that these regulations could be brought in and not amended, and that the House could only say "Aye" or "No." The words are applicable today.
I should now like to turn for a moment to the White Paper itself. Why could not the Government, who have been in office for five years, deal with many of these powers which they want to retain by putting them in the form of Bills, so that they would become in the ordinary way Acts of Parliament? There is one entitled, "Taking Possession of Land." Was it not possible to legislate for that? There is "Requisitioning of Property other than land," "Power to Permit Nuisances where Necessary," "Power to give directions to Local Authorities," and "General Control of Industry." Then, of course, there is the one that was mentioned, 58A "Control of employment," 58AA "Avoidance of Strikes and Lockouts," and there is 68B and 68BB.
Where was the Secretary of Scotland all this time? Because instead of bringing in an Act to deal with Scottish housing, the reconditioning of housing accommodation for agricultural workers in Scotland and for Scottish homeless persons, he acts under wartime legislation, and regulations were brought into the House to deal with those subjects, to which the House could only assent or dissent, and which they could not amend. That is my objection.
The sovereignty of Parliament is certainly involved in this. All the time we have been called upon to surrender our rights and privileges more and more to the Government of the day. This continuous erosion, done bit by bit, is far and away more dangerous to liberty than any attack from outside. We are all awake to that and we are ready to defend our liberties, but this "drip, drip, drip" of erosion is gradually destroying the House more than anything else. It was for those reasons that I put down the Amendment, which I understand will not be called, and I do not propose to move it. But I want to express the view which I strongly hold


that the sovereignty of Parliament should not be interfered with, and that the time has come to stop such interference.

5.17 p.m.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: If the right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies), who has just addressed the House so earnestly and eloquently, had confined his criticism of these regulations to the fact that the House can only reject them and cannot amend them, there would have been considerable force in his argument. It would be a wise extension of Parliamentary procedure to provide that a Prayer could be introduced in a suitable case, not merely for the rejection of an order under review, but for its amendment in some specified respect. That would be something for which a great deal could be said in principle, and whatever difficulties there might be in practice, I should think that the ingenuity of the House would not be inferior to the task of overcoming difficulties of that kind.
But the right hon. and learned Gentleman was very far from limiting his case to that. As I understand him, if the House of Commons had complete power to subject every word, every letter, every comma, the dot on every "i," and the crossing of every "t" to scrutiny, he would still be against this Act and against delegated legislation of any kind. The right hon. and learned Gentleman complained that the House did not seem to take very much interest in a matter in which the sovereignty of Parliament was involved. It may be that that is because he is the only remaining Member of this House who believes that the sovereignty of Parliament is involved in these regulations or that this House at any time, either in war or in peace, either permanently or temporarily, either on an emergency basis or on any other basis, ever tendered to the Executive the sovereignty of Parliament. Certainly not.
We are asserting the sovereignty of Parliament in this very Debate; otherwise, why are we here? The right hon. and learned Gentleman himself could have moved the Amendment which stands on the Order Paper, and could have appealed to the House and to the sovereign powers of Parliament to repeal this Act and the whole of these regulations. Can that be done if the House has

parted with its sovereignty to the Executive? Of course, it could not.

Mr. Pickthorn: It is not true that the House of Commons has, or has ever had, sovereignty.

Mr. Silverman: I do not know what the importance of that interruption is—about as important as the hon. Gentleman himself, I presume. Let us get back to the argument. In his whole attitude to delegated legislation it is the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and not the Government, that is 300 years behind the time or is going back to Charles I. It is the right hon. and learned Gentleman who is going back to King Henry VII. The right hon. and learned Gentleman recited the number of regulations which had been promulgated, and which had the force of statutory law, during the past four or five years. Every one of those regulations was deemed by the Government of the day to be necessary. Every one of them involved an extension or modification of the law. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman had had his way it would have been necessary for the Government to introduce a Bill into Parliament on each one of those several and specific occasions.

Mr. Hopkin Morris: Yes.

Mr. Silverman: That would have been quite right, then. In other words, the Government could not possibly have pursued the policy of economic planning for which it derived authority from the electorate and from the House of Commons.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman, if he had his way, would not be ensuring the freedom of Parliament. He would be bringing about the complete stultification of Parliament. He would have the House of Commons choked up, day after day throughout the whole of its working time, with the detailed, formal, literal discussion, word by word and line by line, of every administrative amendment of the law necessary to put into operation the economic planning for which the House of Commons had already given the Executive authority.

Mr. H. Morrison: Like an urban district council.

Mr. Silverman: Yes, but the urban district council has the capacity and the time to deal with things of that kind. That is what the urban district council is


for—to superintend the local administration of powers delegated to it by Parliament. The right hon. and learned Gentleman must make up his mind what powers he wants the House of Commons to have.

Mr. C. Davies: The logical thing to do, I take it from the hon. Gentleman's argument, is for the House to meet and pass one Act of Parliament, giving the Executive all the power.

Mr. Silverman: The right hon. and learned Gentleman ought really to take more care to do himself greater justice. He knows perfectly well that there is a whole range of colours in the spectrum and that it is not true that everything in the world is either black or white, or that we must either delegate all policy to the Executive or delegate no authority. Those are not the alternatives before the House. The great obligation of Parliament is to see that there is delegated and entrusted to the Government of the day such authority, and no more, as is necessary to give effect to the general policy which the House of Commons wishes to see put into effect. Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman deny, that if his Amendment had been moved and carried, economic planning in this country would come to an end? Would it or would it not come to an end?

An Hon. Member: No.

Mr. C. Davies: What would have happened is that the Government would have had to pass as Acts of Parliament that which they are now doing by regulation under war-time legislation.

Mr. Silverman: The right hon. and learned Gentleman must really bring his mind to bear more seriously on the principle which he wants the House to accept. He has told us how many regulations have been necessary in the last five years. Is he complaining that this Government of all Governments did not bring in more legislation?

Mr. Davies: No.

Mr. Silverman: How did the right hon. and learned Gentleman want it done? He agrees that the Government had the authority, first of the country and then of the House, to put into operation such controls as were necessary—as has been

done in war-time, periods of emergency, and re-armament periods, for limited purposes or special purposes—so that our economic, financial and industrial affairs could be planned, a target be fixed and all the resources of the country trained in the direction of accomplishing that target and that plan.
In his loyalty to the principle of the sovereignty of Parliament the right hon. and learned Gentleman presumably believes that the Government ought to have the power to do that, if the House of Commons wants it done. In order to get it done, he has told us how many amendments of the law had been necessary in the past five years. I think they came to about 5,000.

Mr. Davies: Ten thousand.

Mr. Silverman: Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman saying that the only proper way to do it would have been to have 10,000 Acts of Parliament? Is he really saying that if we had 10,000 Acts of Parliament that would be enhancing the dignity and ensuring the authority and sovereignty of Parliament? This would be turning the House of Commons, not into a Fascist Grand Council, but into the most petty of committees.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman and his party must learn that times change and that the needs of society change with them. As society becomes more complex and the needs of society become more complicated, so does the task of government become more intricate and complicated. So we have to alter the forms of Parliament in order to make sure that the House of Commons preserves its sovereignty and freedom. We create the necessary machinery to enable it to have its way and its will to be done. That is what the Prime Minister surely had in mind in 1937 when he said that this House was not merely a debating forum, but was a place where we considered what we wanted to have done and how we were to create the necessary machinery to have it done.
The right hon. and gallant Gentleman who spoke for the Opposition was quite right: we are not concerned in this matter only with a handful of regulations here and there, but with the whole apparatus of economic planning to which this side of the House is committed and which we believe the country accepted in 1945 once


for all. It is not possible any more to go back to the days when there was no delegated legislation. There is not anybody, apart from Rip Van Winkle—and not even Rip Van Winkle, once he wakes up and rubs his eyes—who believes that we can do without delegated legislation in the modern society.
The right hon. and gallant Member who spoke for the Opposition had different complaints. It was not always easy to see what his main complaint was. At one moment he was saying that my right hon. Friend had accepted his policy, and in the next breath he was saying that there was a fundamental gulf between them. Which is it? I take it that what he meant on the first leg of his argument was that it is proposed now to extend these powers for one year but we are not being asked today to make them permanent. He assumes that that means that the Government have accepted the principle that we shall always do it on a year to year basis. I did not hear my right hon. Friend say that. The fact that we do it on one occasion for one year, does not concede the principle of doing it on a year to year basis or from year to year. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman may have had other reasons. I do not know. On the other hand, he may agree with my right hon. Friend. I do not know that either.
All I am saying is that there is nothing in the proposal made this afternoon to lead the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) to suppose that what my right hon. Friend said in the quotation from a speech at Blackpool a little while ago is not still the Government's policy. Once the principle is conceded that we cannot have economic planning without delegated legislation, and once it is further conceded that we want economic planning, we have accepted for all time the principle of some delegated legislation. It must be so, and we cannot oppose the principle of delegated legislation without setting ourselves lock, stock and barrel against the whole principle of control of our economic affairs. I see hon. Members on the Liberal Benches nod their heads. They are against the control of our economic affairs. They do not want any economic planning at all.

Mr. Hopkin Morris: Oh, no.

Mr. Silverman: I only hope that they will make it clear to the electors on the

next occasion. Their Amendment says that the Liberal Opposition would refuse to continue the Act at all. What does it mean? The end of food rationing? Would they not give the Government any power to have food rationing at any time?

Mr. Hopkin Morris: Does the hon. Gentleman think that this is the only method of securing the welfare of the country? What controlled planning is doing is gradually impoverishing the country.

Mr. Silverman: I really think that the hon. and learned Gentleman is evading the point, however unconsciously. I asked whether the hon. and learned Gentleman wanted any food rationing or not. Presumably he does sometimes want food rationing, at any rate of some things.

Mr. Hopkin Morris: There are better methods of ensuring fairer distribution and more plentiful food in peace-time than rationing.

Mr. Silverman: We cannot have more plentiful distribution unless food is more plentiful. Supposing food is not more plentiful and we want fair shares of what we have. Presumably the hon. and learned Gentleman wants the Government to do something about that?

Mr. Hopkin Morris: The hon. Gentle man is making an assumption first of all which is necessary to his argument that there is only limited supply—

Mr. Silverman: Of some things.

Mr. Hopkin Morris: —of some things. That assumption is unwarranted unless there is control.

Mr. Silverman: I do not want to be too long but I cannot leave that where it is and I am sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman would not wish to leave it there. There is now in force a sweets rationing order. It may not be because there is insufficient sugar. It may be for wholly different reasons. I am sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman, like everybody else in the House, wants the sweets rationing order to continue. Does the hon. and learned Gentleman wish to abolish it?

Mr. Hopkin Morris: Yes.

Mr. Silverman: I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman will tell his constituents so because not one per cent. of them will agree with it.

Mr. Ivor Owen Thomas: Who would get the sweets then?

Mr. Silverman: It is the hon. and learned Gentleman and not I, who is making unwarranted assumptions. If we are to have a policy of fair shares—

Mr. Hopkin Morris: That is an assumption.

Mr. Silverman: If the hon. and learned Gentleman says that he does not want a policy of fair shares, obviously he does not want any regulations, any Supplies and Services Act or any economic planning. He wants nothing but the law of the jungle in which the man with the most money in the longest pocket will get all there is. Is that the new Liberalism? Is this what the Liberals will put in their election manifesto?

Mr. Hopkin Morris: That is a very cheap rhetorical question. The whole issue is very much more profound than that. I do not want to take the hon. Member's time for arguing but at the proper time I shall argue it.

Mr. Silverman: The question is neither cheap nor rhetorical. There is still economic difficulty in the world. The cost of rearmament will not make those difficulties less. The necessity for a positive policy, if fair shares are to be secured will be greater in the next year or two than it has been in the last year or two, not less than it has been. Therefore, it is not by any means a cheap thing to ask, in the light of the expectation of renewed economic difficulties due to rearmament all over the world, whether the hon. and learned Gentleman wants a policy of fair shares or not.
When he says that the question is rhetorical he is quite mistaken. A rhetorical question is asked when one does not want the person questioned to answer. I asked the question because I am vitally interested in the answer, and so is everybody who may some day be called upon to vote for a Liberal candidate anywhere in the country. It is quite clear that we cannot have any of these things unless we have delegated legislation and unless the Government have the

powers in this Act. The right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery conceded it in war-time. Why? Because it is necessary in war-time?

Mr. C. Davies: Certainly.

Mr. Silverman: Very well. Then the test of it is not the war-time but the necessity. We do not have it in war-time for its own sake. We have it in war-time because it is necessary in war-time. Therefore, if it is necessary in peace-time we have it in peace-time as well.

Mr. Davies: The hon. Gentleman is getting most confused. He draws no distinction between war and peace. There is no distinction in his mind between war and peace. Tell the people that.

Mr. Silverman: I draw a distinction between what is necessary and what is unnecessary. It seems to me the only reasonable distinction to draw, unless the right hon. and learned Gentleman is saying that in war-time he would give the Government these powers whether they were necessary or not. He says that he would not give them to the Government even in war-time except on the ground that he believes that in war-time they are necessary. Thus he concedes absolutely that it is not war or peace that makes the difference; it is necessity or no necessity that makes the difference.
Therefore, if the Government discharge the onus upon them of proving that the things are necessary to the welfare of the community, then the question of whether they are necessary for war reasons or peace reasons becomes entirely irrelevant. The onus on the Government is to prove the necessity for these powers, and if they can prove that they are necessary in particular circumstances or in all circumstances in peace-time, then they have discharged the only onus that rests upon them. The distinction between wartime and peace-time is artificial and irrelevant unless the argument is that the powers are always necessary in war and never necessary in peace.

Mr. Blackburn: Does the hon. Gentleman disagree with the statement of the Lord President of the Council and the statement issued by the Labour Party that it is desirable to supersede the whole of these Defence Regulations and have a permanent Act for peace-time which will give the necessary powers for economic planning?

Mr. Silverman: The hon. Gentleman either did not hear the first part of my speech—

Mr. Blackburn: I did.

Mr. Silverman: —or did not pay sufficient attention to it. If he reads the OFFICIAL REPORT tomorrow, he will find that I answered the question before he asked it.
The right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough in opening for the Opposition went a stage further. He too said, "Yes, in war-time but not in peace-time," but went on to say, "We will give the Government the powers it asks for today because, although it is not war-time, they are necessary for rearmament." My right hon. Friend said in fact that they were necessary for rearmament and for a great many other things. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman said, "Never mind about the other things. We are not interested in the other things—fair shares, the necessary controls for a planned economy, the rationing, and the winning through from the economic catastrophe which the war caused to solvency and economic independence in the world." All that means nothing to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: If the hon. Gentleman was here when my right hon. and gallant Friend was speaking, all I can say is that his hearing must be singularly defective.

Mr. Silverman: The hon. and learned Member thought it was useful to intervene to say that! My hearing is all right. I heard every word. What the right hon. and gallant Gentleman said—I am sorry he is not here; if he were, I am sure he would confirm that I am not misrepresenting him in the least—was, "Never mind all the other things for which the Lord President thought these powers were necessary; he said they were necessary for rearmament and that is enough for me."

Mr. Pickthorn: No.

Mr. Silverman: He did say so. The hon. Gentleman can go on saying "No" from now to doomsday, but the fact is that it was said, and when he looks in the OFFICIAL REPORT tomorrow I have no doubt he will tender the apology for which his intervention calls—I do not

mean to me, I mean to his right hon. arid gallant Friend whom he seems to be repudiating at the moment. That is what the right hon. and gallant Gentleman said—"We will do it for war, we will do it for re-armament, but no matter what the necessities are"—this is my inference—[Laughter.] It is a very fair inference—"No matter what the necessities are in any other set of circumstances, we are against those powers. Let us have a review from year to year so that we can end them at any moment, if ever the need for rearmament purposes or for war purposes comes to an end." And by saying that, the right hon. and gallant Gentleman established that there was a deep, unbridgable chasm between the two sides of the House.
We are ready to do whatever it is necessary to do in war. We are ready to do whatever it is necessary to do to prevent war. But we do not limit our interest in the nation to that. We say that the powers which the House can safely entrust to the Government for the salvation of the people in war can equally safely be entrusted, at any rate to this Government, for the salvation of all the people in peace. Therefore we support the Motion.

5.44 p.m.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: The hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) is a formidable debater but I have noticed on occasions, of which this afternoon is one, that the discomfort he induces in other hon. Members is most noticeable on the Treasury Bench. Indeed, that impression was fortified by no less a person than the Lord President of the Council who, after the preliminary three quarters of an hour or so of the hon. Gentleman's speech, departed for an engagement elsewhere. I will put it to hon. Members why.
The Lord President this afternoon, in his most reasonable vein, put these proposals forward as being necessary as the result both of the grave aftermath of one war and the possible risk of another. That was his case. Then the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne stood up and said remarkably little about international emergencies. So far as he was concerned—he was quite frank about it—these regulations are the vehicle for the particular kind of economic planning which he favours. Before we have concluded our


discussion on this Motion we should have it put clearly to the House, since it is a matter of some interest to many hon. Members, whether the real reason for these proposals is the reason of the Lord President, the overcoming of an admittedly serious international situation, or that which the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne gave, that this is the necessary technical machinery of Socialism. I think we should be told.
Before I pass from the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne, may I protest at the travesty in which he indulged of the argument made from below the Gangway? So far as I know, nobody in this House has ever suggested that there should be no delegated legislation at all.

Mr. S. Silverman: rose—

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: There was no such suggestion. I will give way in a moment, but the hon. Member may save himself the trouble of rising if he lets me finish my sentence. I understood the suggestion was that statutes should deal with these general subjects such as rationing and, under them, limited powers to deal with small matters by regulation should be conceded. Now I will give way.

Mr. Silverman: The hon. Gentleman surely does not deny that if the Amendment standing on the Order Paper in the name of the Liberal Party were carried, there would be an end of all delegated legislation so far as these powers are concerned?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: So far as these statutes are concerned, certainly; but the hon. Gentleman will also recall that from below the Gangway—although I do not speak from there, I must in fairness invite his attention to this—it was suggested with what I thought was unnecessary repetition, that it would be necessary to have statutes to deal with these matters. Of course, those statutes would themselves give a limited power of delegated legislation and, obviously, nobody will say that every change, say, in rationing made under a rationing scheme requires a statute. Nobody wants an Act of Parliament to arrange the points value of snoek. All that is needed is precise legislation on these issues, giving strictly limited delegated powers

such as were given by many Acts of Parliament in the years between the wars.

Mr. Silverman: I know that is the point of view of the hon. Gentleman and of many of his hon. Friends. I know they do not care for the more extreme views below the Gangway. When, however, I asked in the course of my speech, "Does that mean the end of all delegated legislation?" the hon. and learned Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Hopkin Morris) said "Yes, certainly, it means that." Then he subjected me to a five-minute cross-examination to make it clear that was indeed his view.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: My impression was that the cross-examination was the other way. I do not think any responsible person ever suggested that we could get through in a modern society without some delegated legislation. Where we differ strongly from the point of view of the hon. Member is the degree and extent. I do not think the hon. Gentleman will quarrel with me when I say that the present proposals are examples of delegated legislation in its widest form. The powers given are virtually unlimited. The Parliamentary control is largely illusory. There is none of that strict limitation of the powers of Ministers which in more or less degree was imposed before the war.
I felt that the Lord President of the Council used an argument which will not stand up to examination. The tenor of his speech was that this was a small, almost a technical matter. He began by saying—and I made a note of it—that no power to make new Defence Regulations survived. That is perfectly true. It is also almost completely irrelevant, because no one knows better than the Lord President that the real powers are not exercised directly by the Defence Regulations. They are exercised by statutory instruments made under powers given by the Defence Regulations concerned. And as the Defence Regulations cover practically every sphere of human activity and give almost unlimited powers, the fact that no new ones can be created is completely irrelevant to our discussion. What is material is that the power to make new statutory instruments under Defence Regulations remains and will be preserved in full if this Motion is carried. I do not think that the Lord President was


being quite fair with the House when he suggested that there was some advantage to be gained from the admitted fact that no new Defence Regulations could be made.
Another very significant thing in the speech of the Lord President—which, perhaps, again to his embarrassment, the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne underlined—was his interruption of my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) when he said that, although this Act was being renewed for one year, there was no guarantee for the future. We are really entitled to be told a little more of what the Government mean. After all, it is one thing at a time of emergency like this—no one seriously, I think, disputes the emergency—to concede the power for one year, but if that concession is intended merely to be the foundation upon which the permanent structure forecast last year at Blackpool by the Lord President is to be erected, that puts a totally different complexion on the matter. It would be a little shabby for the Lord President to seek the assent of this House to the extension of these powers for another year if at the back of his mind there was, not merely that extension for another year, but that permanent structure to which he referred at Blackpool, as a basis for the economic planning to which the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne referred.
The other issue that seems to me of great gravity arises from what I tried to say a moment ago to the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne: the importance of the issues that can be handled in this way. After all, Regulation 58A is to be continued, and under it, therefore, it is completely open to the Government to introduce control of engagement at any moment that suits their convenience. That is a very grave matter indeed. I do not want, Mr. Deputy-Speaker—indeed, I am sure you would rule me out of order, if I tried to do so—to discuss the merits of the order, but surely all hon. Members can agree about this: that control of engagement is not a matter which should be effected by statutory instrument.

Mr. Blackburn: Hear, hear.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: It is a matter which, if it is to be imposed at all, is so

grave a matter that only the full procedure of statute, with all the full possibilities of amendment that alone arise when we can deal with the matter by statute, should be employed. If it is done by statutory instrument, there is no possibility of amendment, nor, indeed, is there any certainty that there will be Parliamentary discussion at all before the instrument comes into effect. If the instrument is laid in the Recess, it can come into force at any date then stated and can be in force before the House can be recalled. I beg hon. Members to think, at any rate, on this. If we are to give to any Minister the right to say to any British citizen where he is to work and at what, it surely is the least we can demand that that should only be done after an Act of Parliament has been passed after full and untrammelled debate.
Regulation 58A, under which that order is made, and which it is proposed by the Motion to keep in force, is really one of the most tremendous potential instruments of tyranny ever handed to a Minister of the Crown. I do not know how many hon. Members are familiar with its exact terms. Let me read just one paragraph:
The Minister of Labour and National Service … or any National Service Officer may direct any person in Great Britain to perform such services in the United Kingdom or in any British ship not being a Dominion ship as may be specified by or described in the direction, being services which that person is, in the opinion of the Minister or Officer, capable of performing.
These are tremendous powers, yet it is proposed to keep them in being under this Motion merely on the Lord President's assurance that at present he does not propose to exercise them.
That is not good enough. Indeed, the very intention not to use it at present is one of the strongest arguments for not giving this power, because that emphasises its wholly unnecessary character at this moment. Any hon. Member who knows the flexibility of Parliamentary procedure knows perfectly well that, should it become necessary in some regrettable emergency, it would be perfectly easy to get the necessary powers in a Bill which could be passed in a day.
The other statutory instrument that strikes me as far too wide in its powers is No. 55. I am fortified in that view by no less a person than Mr. Morgan Phillips, who a little time ago committed


himself to the view that publicly supported enterprises, to compete with private enterprise in any industry, could be legally set going on the basis of this Regulation. That observation of Mr. Morgan Phillips seemed to have remarkably little to do with the international emergency to which the Lord President referred, but seemed to have much more to do with the Socialist proposals which are so much dearer to the heart of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne. One has only to look at the extraordinarily wide powers given by that Regulation to be forced to one of two conclusions. Either it is unnecessary that those immense powers should be given, or, if they are to be given, they should only be given after full debate on the Floor of this House.
Then, says the Lord President, none of these things matter very much because there is Parliamentary control. With the greatest respect to the Lord President, I would adopt that phrase which is always associated in this House with the late Minister of Defence: "It is poppycock." The Lord President knows perfectly well that of the 3,000 statutory instruments produced now every year, it is not physically possible for this House to deal with more than a handful. Nobody knows better than the Lord President the difficulty of dealing with complex Measures that cannot be amended. I agree with the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne in suggesting that we should not have to deal with these enormously complicated matters without being able to amend them in one way or another. Surely, the Lord President knows perfectly well that that Parliamentary control is quite inadequate.
The right hon. Gentleman paid a tribute to the Scrutiny Committee, which I would support. He did not, however, point out that by the terms under which that Committee was set up it cannot deal with the most important aspect of all—the merits of the orders it reviews—but only with certain technical details relating to their form and presentation. I do not believe that any hon. Member really believes that if important matters of this sort are to be dealt with by statutory instrument, the Parliamentary control which the Lord President so praised begins to be adequate to deal with the task.
We are put in an intolerable position by this Motion; it is a method rather like

the procedure of the orders made under it. We are asked either to accept or to refuse—"Aye" or "No"—the continuation of a whole mass of powers, some of them vitally necessary, some of which it is not even proposed to use, some highly oppressive and some highly beneficial, all lumped together in one Motion with no possibility of putting down an Amendment to delete one or another—it is the whole mass or none. The Lord President says, "You will throw the country into confusion if you refuse this," saying it, as the result of the situation he himself has created, with perfect truth because, owing to the refusal of the Government to put the necessary powers into statutory form, what the Lord President now says is completely true.
It is really an intolerable way to treat the House of Commons to put the pistol at its head in this way and to say, "Economic confusion on 10th December, or give us powers which many of you think grossly excessive." When the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne then says that that process is the assertion of Parliamentary sovereignty, he fails to understand the meaning of words. One of my hon. Friends pointed out to the hon. Member that this House has never been sovereign, anyhow; but to suggest that, if it had been, to pass this vast blanket Resolution, conferring all these powers, is an assertion of sovereignty, is simply playing with words. Hon. Members know perfectly well that the power and authority of this House must be smaller if we concede these powers than if we retain them; if we subtract from our own control the right to mould and to amend the legislation of the Government and leave that process to Ministers in their offices by the simple process of signing a scrap of paper, we have given up much of our power.
There is a certain rather bitter irony in the fact that this proposal comes forward in the very week in which this House is about to go to its new and more splendid quarters. There is a certain irony that at this moment this House should be handing over so much of the authority for which our predecessors struggled. There is a great deal of irony that this should be done in this brisk way by a Lord President of the Council who seeks to conceal behind a jaunty manner his contempt for Parliamentary institutions.

6.0 p.m.

Mr. John McKay: I wish to enter this discussion because I have listened to it from the beginning and have been rather interested in some of the conclusions at which many hon. Members have arrived. There has been a great deal of discussion about sovereignty, the powers of Parliament and the question of whether this is a suitable occasion or time to renew these special powers of the Government. When one saw the emergence on the Order Paper of names of Liberal Members, one expected a very vivid picture to be painted of the tremendous evils which had happened in the last five years during which these special powers had been operating. But, one of the chief weaknesses of the speech of the Leader of the Liberal Party was that he could point to very little that had been done under the regulations which was abnormal or against the interests of the country.
The opposition to the Government's attitude today is admittedly based on the fact that this is a peaceful period and that what we passed during the war should be abolished now because we have peace. Such ideas, expressed at this period, are influenced in the same way as those of the pacifist when discussing the whole international situation, but to my mind this is not a period of peace. How can anyone describe the present period as a peaceful period when we are piling up, and working to pile up, tremendous armaments for the future? That is an absolute denial that we are in a period of peace. We are far from it. To my mind the whole attitude, principles and viewpoint expressed by the Leader of the Liberal Party are inapplicable to the period in which we are living.
Because we believed in certain principles in the past, in time of peace, it does not follow, even if we had full peace now, that we must continue to believe those things for evermore. I always understood that, as time went on, we changed our viewpoints and we changed them on a progressive scale with a view to meeting new conditions under which we are living. That is the position in which we are today. We are in a position where we have no peace. There is the question of international disputes and industrial disputes which would probably arise if it were not for the special emergency powers.
At present, for instance, we have demands for increased wages arising throughout the country in various industries. As I understand, one of the things arising out of these emergency regulations is the fact that in all these big industrial disputes 21 days' notice must be given to the Government before a strike can be called. The workers, being forced to do that before they can legally strike, the Government are given time to institute an inquiry and there is almost compulsory arbitration established. I presume that if we did away with all these emergency powers, we would do away with that regulation also. Would we not then be in a serious plight with all the big trade unions looking at the rise in prices and the lower wages in some industries? What would be the position if all these people were allowed to give immediate notice to strike? It would be a serious position. I presume that is one of the factors in the present situation underlying the present discussion.
To my mind nothing very serious will happen if this Motion is passed, but as the Leader of the House mentioned, if we do away with these regulations and allow absolute freedom in the industrial world and all economic fields, there will be real chaos in the country. Therefore, taking all these things into consideration, this is a wise thing to do at the moment, to keep our hands upon the country and not to give absolute freedom in a way which would lead to industrial disputes, perhaps unnecessarily, and other evils of which we well know. I am quite in harmony with the views of the Government on this occasion.

6.8 p.m.

Mr. Derek Walker-Smith: All the speeches made from the other side of the House this evening have had this in common, that they have contained various propositions which I could only describe in the most moderate terms at my command as shocking. The hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. McKay) was no exception, as I understood that in a part of his speech he asked the House to believe there were certain things which one grows out of in the way of progress and he seemed to include in their number liberty and Parliamentary institutions. The hon. Member must not think that because he can find one or two, or perhaps many more, good things in the whole of these


Defence Regulations that those good points could not be enforced by any other machinery. They could, of course, if they are valuable, on a long-term basis be included in Acts of Parliament. The same applied to the speech of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), who was a little more frank, perhaps, than the Lord President of the Council in the sense that he said that of course the Supplies and Services Act and the Defence Regulations were part of the apparatus of economic controls. He was saying today what the Lord President said in the plenitude of power in the last Parliament in 1949.
The speech of the Lord President of the Council was particularly disappointing because, in spite of his position, he never rose above the low level of administrative convenience. He never got to grips with the questions of principle raised by my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) and the Leader of the Liberal Party; he never got to grips with the question of the effect of the sovereignty of Parliament and the rule of law on the continuance of this procedure. I wish to address myself to that.
I suggest that there are three basic principles by which this House should be guided in these matters. The first is that in times of emergency the Executive must have the powers required for the defence and security of the country. In those circumstances it is the duty of Parliament, first to give the Executive those powers and then to prevent the abuse of those powers by the Executive. The second basic principle is that such powers are part of the machinery of emergency only and are not for continued use in normal times. The third basic principle is that the long-term requirements must be met by legislation and not by Defence Regulations; they must be met by statute and be subject to all the opportunities for detailed scrutiny and debate thus afforded.
Those are, in my submission, the three principles upon which we should judge this matter. It is a fair deduction from those principles that it is possible, at all events broadly, to separate matters affecting defence and security from matters affecting long-term economic considerations. Matters affecting defence and security may require to be dealt with by

emergency powers such as Defence Regulations. The hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), in addition to a large number of more subtle matters which pass his comprehension, seemed to be unable to see any distinction between war and peace. There is the clear distinction that in matters affecting defence and security, in the proper sense of those words, immediate action may well be necessary and anticipation may be very difficult. That is the justification for emergency powers in respect of defence on the basis of the maxim:
Salus populi suprema lex.
The long-term requirements of economic control must normally be met by statute. From that it follows that there is a duty on any democratic Government to distinguish between the two, to specify what in their view is long-term and what in their view are emergency requirements; and to reduce the long-term requirements to statutory form and submit them for the consideration of this House and for the judgment of those whom we here have the honour to represent.
Nor is the task particularly difficult, because the Defence Regulations themselves made that distinction. Parts I and II of the Defence Regulations deal specifically with matters which can properly be called matters of defence and security. Part III and particularly Part IV deal with matters of economic control. The effect of the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945, was, as the House knows, to continue all the major economic defence regulations of Part IV with greatly expanded scope. The Lord President of the Council seemed to doubt it when I suggested that the scope was expanded, but the House has only to take the obvious illustration of Regulation 51, which was originally a regulation for requisitioning for purely defence purposes. Enormously expanded powers of requisition are exercised today under its authority.
The real indictment against this Government is that for five years they have clung to the powers of Defence Regulations and have not attempted the duty of segregation. They have not attempted to put their long-term requirements into statutory form for the consideration of Parliament. That I can consider only as an offence against democracy


and against Parliamentary institutions. The memorandum which was quoted by the Lord President of the Council refers to 35 Defence Regulations as having been revoked. But it is not the numbers that matter; it is the sort of Regulations which have been revoked. No major Regulation has been revoked. I would challenge the Lord President on that, but he is not in his seat. He has all these matters at his finger-tips and would be able to reply at once.
I challenge the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is to reply, to specify regulations of major importance within Part IV which have been allowed to lapse. The sort of regulation which has gone from Part IV is Regulation 57AA, which deals with the relaxation of enactments relating to the deficiency in the calorific value, pressure, or purity of gas. The right hon. Gentleman knows a good deal about gas; he had experience of it in the previous Department of which he was Minister. But even he would hardly suggest that that is one of the major Defence Regulations. All the major Defence Regulations in Part IV continue as Defence Regulations without any attempt to put them into statutory form or to specify whether, in the words of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne, they are part of the apparatus of economic planning, or whether they are emergency measures.
We have in fact the unhappy paradox that regulations which are really necessary for defence and security have lapsed, whereas it is proposed to continue regulations which ought to have been put into statutory form, if they are to be retained at all. Those required to rivet Socialism are retained and strengthened; those required for the safety of the State are allowed to go. Would not Regulation 2B, with its power to deal with sabotage, be very useful today? But it has gone. There might be need of such a Regulation as 39A, which deals with the seducing of persons from their duty and the causing of disaffection; but it has gone. Where the Government should have been firm they have been feeble; where they should be magnanimous they are vindictive.
The Government are using Defence Regulations to apply the so-called planned economy. The Lord President of the Council admitted it last year. The hon.

Member for Nelson and Colne, who on an objective appreciation has perhaps come to the conclusion that he has less to lose, still pronounces that view today. Of course he is right. The Defence Regulations are a suitable instrument of an arbitrary policy, because these emergency powers operate to depress the right of the citizen and to restrict the discretion of the courts. The hon. Member for Wallsend said that there had been very little reference to the matters in which Defence Regulations had caused harm. It was a fair point, and deserves a fair answer. Here are some of them.
Reference has already been made to the basic disadvantage that these Regulations are not subject to the detailed scrutiny of Parliament, and cannot be amended by Parliament. That was admitted even by the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne, for which dangerous piece of deviationism he will no doubt be sharply rebuked by the proper quarters at the proper time. Even when the Defence Regulations are in operation, they often operate in an anti-social sort of way, a way which is unsuitable to our constitutional traditions. For example, it is not necessary in the ordinary way that there should, under the Defence Regulations, be any guilty intent to establish an offence. In these Defence Regulations minimum penalties are specified as well as maximum penalties, thereby tying the hands of His Majesty's judges.
These regulations greatly enlarge the jurisdiction of the courts of summary justice, with the effect that great matters are dealt with by courts of petty sessions far beyond what was intended to be the jurisdiction or practice of such courts. Finally, the courts may not question the reasonableness of any Ministerial direction given under these instruments, however low in the bureaucratic scale may be the source from which that direction may really emanate. That was made clear in the case of Horton v. Owen in, I think, 1943, when the then Lord Chief Justice had to rule that the courts were not concerned with the reasonableness of the direction so long as it was given in due form.
As an ounce of illustration is worth perhaps a pound of theory, may I give the House, very quickly, two cases of which I have personal knowledge to illustrate that point? The first arose


under Defence Regulation 58A, Control of Employment. It was a case which attracted some attention at the time, because it was a case in which a great company, whose name is very well known, were concerned in regard to a stenographer. She was a young girl of British citizenship but foreign extraction; and perhaps for that reason was not, in popular parlance, everybody's money for the purpose of getting a job. The Ministry of Labour in their wisdom directed this girl successively to six different employers, none of whom were willing to employ her. But the company did give her a job, and a useful job, was prosecuted for the offence of providing employment for a worthy person who would have been unemployed if the successive efforts of the bureaucrats had not been reinforced by that voluntary action. That is the first case to which I draw attention. Because, as the reasonableness of the direction could not be called in question, the court had no alternative except to find the offence proved.
The other illustration I should like to give the House arose under the First Census of Production Order and concerns Defence Regulation 55A. In that case it was not a great company; it was a small company whose business it was to recondition boilers. Their job was to take old boilers and make them into new boilers; and in doing that in the year for which the census applied they reconditioned 175 boilers but used no raw steel at all, because they simply took the old ones and made them into new. When they looked at the census of production of the Board of Trade they found they could not fill in the census except by supplying answers which would have been identical with a firm which had made 175 new boilers and used 965 tons of raw steel. What happened? They said, "We are conscientious men. We will not make an entry which is not only valueless but misleading." What did the Board of Trade say? They said, "Go on, fill it in, get it done." Because they were conscientious men they preferred to be prosecuted for failing to comply with the requirements of that order.
As I say, they were not like the other company. They were not a great company, they were small men—the modern equivalent perhaps of the village Hampdens

—who preferred to be prosecuted under this regulation—[Interruption.] Hon. Members may laugh. Perhaps the hon. Member for Preston, South (Mr. Shackleton), would say what he would have advised? Would he have taken the advice of the Board of Trade and filled in these misleading and valueless statistics? On which side would he have stood? The hon. Member is quick to cackle, but slow to answer.

Mr. Shackleton: If the hon. Member would like to meet me afterwards I will tell him precisely what I was laughing at. He has completely misunderstood me.

Mr. Walker-Smith: The hon. Member is perhaps more easily misunderstood than understood. No doubt all suitable assistance will be given to his constituents at Preston to form a suitable view of the attention which the hon. Member gives to Parliamentary debates.
May I pass very quickly to refer to two other Defence Regulations? The first of these is the very important one, 56A, Control of Building Operations. In my view the time has come to decide first, whether that control is still required, and if so, how long and in what form it should be continued? I ask the House to believe—I have not the time to enter into this in detail—that the system of control by cost as laid down in that Defence Regulation leads to endless difficulties in practice, and leads to a good deal of hardship upon the building contractor. It is proper, if that regulation is to be continued, that it should be put in statutory form so that the necessary amendments may be made for its improvement in the future.
Then there is the case of Defence Regulation 51, the requisitioning regulation. It is a constitutional doctrine in this country that there should be no requisitioning in time of peace. In war it has always been accepted, not because it does not create hardship and difficulty in time of war, but because, in time of war, such hardship is much less than death and suffering and bereavement which may be suffered by us all. But today the Government appear to be viewing requisitioning as part of the permanent peace-time machinery of this country. The earliest possible end of requisitioning when this Motion is passed will be the end of December, 1953.
All over the country there are cases where property has been transferred from requisitioning by the military authorities to the civil authorities with the consequence that there may be 14 years continuous deprivation of land or property suffered by the citizen. It is the duty of Parliament to recognise that hardship exists and face this situation squarely. We have to ask ourselves the question, how long are these powers required for and how long is it proposed to continue them?—[An HON. MEMBER: "A year."]—An hon. Member said one year—for the moment. But it was clear from the speech of the Lord President that it may well be more than that. And we know that as long as the present housing programme is not more successful the Government will require requisitioning to bolster up their ineffective housing results.
If the power of requisitioning is required much longer it will become very much like permanent compulsory acquisition with this great difference; that in requisitioning there is no right of objection or of inquiry, as there is in cases of compulsory acquisition. There is not even the right of the test of the balance of hardship that exists, for example, under the Rent Restriction Acts. That is not the sort of procedure which either can or should be part and parcel of the permanent peace-time machinery of this country.
If requisitioning is necessary for any protracted period then it should be governed by a proper code which will allow the rights of the dispossessed to be taken into account in a way in which they are not today. That regulation must either end at the scheduled time, or not far from it; or, if the Government believe that is not possible, then it is their duty to work out a code of procedure and bring it in statutory form for the consent of this House.
I have referred to two or three Defence Regulations only, but examination of most of the others would lead to the same conclusion, that this duty of segregation does exist and it is the duty of the Government to put long-term requirements into statutory form. After all, this was a country in which every stick and every stone was wont to speak of liberty and respect for the law. Both liberty and respect for the law are endangered by the mechanical prolongation of emergency powers.
I should like respectfully to echo what was said by my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) to the effect that this House should give express notice to whichever right hon. Gentleman may be seated on the Treasury Bench in 12 months' time that no automatic renewal of this Act will be granted if peace prevails at that time. Parliament and people will not tolerate a cloaking of long-term political objectives behind the machinery of emergency powers. They demand a return to the sound and seemly constitutional doctrines which gave us our laws and our liberties.

6.30 p.m.

Mr. Maclay: I agree most profoundly with the closing remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford (Mr. Walker-Smith). I remember only too well in a Debate in 1945, on the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, venturing to ask the Lord President of the Council what was meant by the word "Transitional" in the Title of the Bill. Did it mean, as we were led to believe by the Debate, transition from war to peace or from shortages to reasonable supply; or did it mean, as appeared only too likely even then, the transition from the condition the country used to live in to a Socialist State?
I have heard nothing today from the Lord President or anybody else which denied my fear at that time that these powers are not really required only because of the emergency and for the purposes which sounded so reasonable when the Lord President was talking; today's discussion has only gone to confirm that they are a convenient cover for the Socialist Party to do things which otherwise they would have had great difficulty in selling to the country, quite apart from the House of Commons. That is what must make us view the Debate with a great deal of suspicion.
I noticed, as I have noticed before in this Parliament, that I agreed with almost everything said earlier this afternoon by the right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies). We could not fail to agree with his arguments. I only hope that the process will continue and that we will find ourselves agreeing more and more in the months and years to come. I am sure that it will, because both of us believe profoundly in the essential liberties of this country and in


the constitutional position of Parliament, both of which we believe to be threatened. We are bound to work increasingly close together for that reason if for no other. The right hon. and learned Gentleman emphasised the tremendous dangers which we run in allowing these powers to continue indefinitely.
I cannot resist quoting briefly from Regulation 55 to which my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) referred. He dealt most effectively with Regulation 58. It should be realised that this is what Regulation 55 says:
A competent authority… may by order provide—
(a) for regulating or prohibiting the production, treatment, keeping, storage, movement, transport, distribution, disposal, acquisition, use or consumption of articles of any description;
And then it says:
(e) for any incidental and supplementary matters for which the competent authority thinks it expedient for the purposes of the order to provide;
The Lord President made a good deal, in his opening speech, of the regulations that had been allowed to disappear. He went on to cover fairly briefly those which remained. When one was listening one realised, even from his brief speech, that the powers he was taking cover every part of our life. There is no part of our life which is not touched by the regulations which still survive.
The trouble we on this side of the House are in at this particular moment is that we could not agree with the extreme view expressed by the hon. and learned Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Hopkin Morris), that at this moment we can sweep away all controls. My real charge against the Government is that probably we could have swept away a great many of these regulations in the period between 1945 and 1950; now, faced with this new world situation there may again be need for some of them because we are now in a period of possible shortages and of stock-piling, and defence must be our major thought. The trouble is that the Government, in the last five years, have created an excessively rigid economy.
One of the reasons for this may well be—we believe that it is—that under the regulatory powers which they have maintained,

without having to bring legislation to the Floor of the House, they have carried on for far too long a tight system of control without which we would have been infinitely better off. The Lord President mentioned that balance of payments difficulties are likely to be with us for some time—I think that those were approximately his words. I wonder if it has occurred to him or to the Government that the rigidity of structure in our economic life which they have created may account for balance of payments difficulties remaining with us for much longer than would have been the case if we had had a much more flexible economy. I do not say that all controls could have been thrown off in the last five years. That would be folly. Nor do I say that they should all be thrown off now. But there is no shadow of doubt that we enter this most difficult period with an economy which is far too rigid, and I think that these regulations are as much to blame as anything for that.
What is more, if the Lord President visualises, as I think he does, exchange control as a permanent part of our life, then I think that exchange and balance of payments difficulties will be with us for ever more. These controls must come off in time or we will never know what our productive ability is. We will be so tied down and rigid that our chances of ultimate flexibility will decrease as the years go by.
There is another point which is a deplorable reflection of the Lord President's motives in keeping on these regulations. He said—and he will correct me if I am wrong—that it is very handy to have Defence Regulations available to use as interim amendments to pre-war statutes. That is a most shocking justification. I remember only too well in the early part of the last Parliament discussing the Distribution of Industry Act, which was passed by the Caretaker Government. I have forgotten how the occasion arose. We were discussing the controversial Clause 9 which disappeared because neither side of the House was satisfied with it.
In the original Bill Clause 9 gave powers to determine when to prohibit certain areas as unsuitable for future industrial development. On all sides of the House and upstairs in Committee


great concern was expressed about that Clause and it was dropped in order to get the Bill through the House. When we came to the next Parliament the attitude on the Government benches was, "Clause 9 was very controversial and tiresome; we could not have got it through without holding everything up. Now we are in power it does not matter, because we have got the Defence Regulation." That is a shocking example. Under these regulations and the various controls which spring from them, discussion of the prohibition of certain areas from future development by industry has been evaded altogether. We have never had that discussion to this day. That is one of the reasons why this state of affairs simply must not continue.
Those of us who are really concerned about the international situation and our own position are in this dilemma. We admit that we need some of these continuing controls; but can we trust the Government to use the powers in the long-term interest of the nation and not of their own political party? That is what matters. We cannot trust them. We are, however, in the dilemma that we cannot vote against the continuation of these regulations because of the national need. Our position is in some ways comparable to that arising from being unable to amend a regulation but only to move Prayers for annulment. Not only does that make a bad position still worse, but hon. Members opposite use it against us.
I have had it thrown against me in my constituency that I voted against such and such a regulation. I have had to go to considerable trouble to correct a wrong impression, because all I have done has been to vote for a Prayer to annul, the whole motive of which was to get a necessary Amendment made to the regulation. Hon. Members opposite and their supporters use that kind of thing unscrupulously against us, and, at least, let the Lord President listen to the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) when he suggested that that matter should be looked at, and, until then, will he get either Transport House or his own office to issue instructions—

Mr. H. Morrison: Will the hon. Gentleman get the Conservative Party Central Office or the Liberal Party to

issue instructions not to deal unscrupulously and naughtily with us? Is the hon. Gentleman offering a treaty between high contracting parties on both sides?

Mr. Maclay: The Lord President has accepted some responsibility by that remark for the really naughty things that have been done by the Labour Party. That is quite clear from his intervention, though I am not conscious of any comparable things done by those who sit on this side of the House.
Finally, may I say that I now sit down in the thoroughly unsatisfactory mood that I would like to vote against this Motion, but cannot in the present international situation? The Lord President knows very well that he has got us in a very difficult spot.

6.41 p.m.

Mr. Snow: I find it difficult to follow the arguments employed by the hon. Member for Renfrew, West (Mr. Maclay), who has just sat down. Like many other people who have spoken, I find myself in sympathy with the dilemma of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank). I listened to his speech, and I gathered that the prevailing theme was that he would like to see these regulations embodied in an Act of Parliament on the Statute Book, following the suggestion made by my right hon. Friend the Lord President himself some years ago, but, at the same time, in present circumstances, he would not himself recommend his party to vote against the Motion.
I think he was putting the matter pretty fairly. Many of us would like to see these regulations on the Statute Book, but I think the Lord President would be very wrong indeed if he was hurried into producing a Bill to do this very thing. One has only to listen to speeches like that of the hon. Member for Hertford (Mr. Walker-Smith), who gave us that curious history of the stenographer of foreign origin but British nationality. It seems to me that, only as time goes on, can we judge whether these regulations under the Supplies and Services Act are good in practice and whether they work out, but, of course, there are other matters to which I wish to draw the attention of the House.
Before I do so, may I say that, earlier this afternoon, I saw the Chief Opposition Whip go across and talk to the National liberal bloc, if that is the right term, and also to the Liberals, and I have not spent four years at the silent end of my own Front Bench without having a reasonable idea what that conversation was? I saw a grimace on the face of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) and I have a shrewd suspicion what had caused it. Of course, when the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough made his speech, I could see what was coming out and what the trouble was.

Mr. Maclay: This is all very difficult. Somebody is always referring to someone who laughs and this kind of thing, but the answer has always been that the laughter had nothing to do with the point which the hon. Gentleman thought it had. As far as I am concerned, this Debate was not discussed at all this afternoon. I do not think that it was discussed below me either.

Mr. Snow: Far be it from me to create mischief between the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery and the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Churchill). I am not in all these high "You scratch my back, I'll scratch your back" consultations which go on between these two right hon. Gentlemen, but it seems to me that it was fairly obvious that the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery was very displeased indeed with the attitude displayed by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough, and I could quite understand his displeasure.
Surely the real difficulty is that, if we are to argue this business on the purely legal basis suggested by the arguments of the hon. Member for Hertford, the question arises whether we are at peace. Technically, we are not at peace with Germany, Japan or Austria, but, technically, we are at peace with Russia. So far as the Defence Regulations are concerned, is it not a fact that we all envisage these Defence Regulations in terms of our relationship with Russia and her satellites? If we are honest, we know that that is the case.
But I have a quarrel with my own Front Bench as well. We are asked to approve of the continuance, for instance, of Regulation 55AB, dealing with price control on goods and services. During the last few months, we have seen disastrous increases in the prices of certain foodstuffs which were on points before, which were and which are imported on private licence, which have been derationed and from which price control has been removed. One has only to walk into the ordinary grocery store to find out the very great increase in prices which has taken place within the past few months. If we are asked for a continuance of these regulations, is it not right that the Government should be asked that they shall, on occasion, use them in such vital matters as price control of foodstuffs?

Mr. Osborne: Would the hon. Gentleman agree that that would apply equally to the cost price of raw materials controlled by the Ministry of Supply, by whom the price is fixed?

Mr. Snow: The great difference is that the raw materials to which the hon. Gentleman refers are raw materials considered by independent committees to be necessary for the industrial welfare of the country, and these are foodstuffs imported under private licence, with which, in fact, we could have used precisely the same policy as was in operation nine months ago.
These importers were told that they might import if they wished, but that they would be unable to sell over a certain price. The importers were placed in a very strong position when they went abroad to buy, and they could tell the exporters that they must be given a price which would permit them to sell retail in this country at no more than a certain maximum which was specified by the Ministry. As I understand it, that policy must have been given up, because we have had a catastrophic rise in prices.
I believe it was Pym who said that any assembly of Parliament which did not repair the breaches and the ravages of time, so far as its constitution was concerned, was not doing its duty. I will conclude by pleading with the Lord President not to be hurried into making an Act of these regulations, but to allow time to show how far they are efficient and which of them can, in fact, be removed.

6.48 p.m.

Mr. Pickthorn: I hope I can be brief. I think almost all the learning and the detailed argument required upon this subject have been offered to the House by various speakers, but I hope the Lord President, whom I am glad to see back in his place, will be kind enough to listen to me for a very few minutes if I try to explain why it is that some of us are very much disquieted by his Motion.
This is an old battle. If it matters to anybody but me, I can with justice say, and the Lord President will bear me out, that some of us have always been highly critical of measures of this sort when our own party was in office. It is, I feel, too, in many ways a sad battle. It has been a losing battle for long periods of years, and, then suddenly with luck we get back and start once again; because, whatever, party is in office, it tends on the whole to desire to have greater power for the Executive. We ought, therefore, to be treated with very great indulgence—those of us who are tiresome upon this point.
Secondly, none of us on this side of the House—I think, I can only speak for myself and do not pretend to speak for anybody but myself—would dissent from the words of the right hon. Gentleman who leads the Opposition when he spoke of "insisting upon continuation only on a year-to-year basis"; but I do not think that can reasonably be taken to mean that we insist on everything being continued. What it clearly means is that whatever powers are continued, should be continued for no more than one year.
There are two points under this head which I would invite the Lord President to think about. One is that, wherever the Government can be shown to ask from Parliament greater powers than they themselves say are likely to be used, then the onus of proof must be very heavily laid on the Government. That is a rather complicated sentence, but I hope I finished it up plainly. It is certainly true—and it was much emphasised by several of the speeches from the Socialist side today—that very many of the powers hereby being continued for a year are, in fact, powers which right hon. and hon. Members on both sides find it difficult to imagine the Government using, for instance, extreme powers of direction of labour, extreme powers of Government intervention in industry, and so on. I

need not go into the specific regulations because those have been mentioned already. There is a very strong onus of proof on a Government which ask for powers and yet themselves admit that those powers are much greater than they are at all likely to use. That is certainly asking for more powers than the House ought to let them have, and we really have had no answer to that at all.
The second point I wish to put—and I wish that some hon. Member opposite would try to think that those who speak as I am speaking now speak with very deep feeling in the matter—is that nobody likes being blackmailed. I do not know whether the Lord President has ever been blackmailed; I hope he has not. What is much more disagreeable than being blackmailed on one's vices is being blackmailed on one's virtues; and it is also much more wicked on the part of the blackmailer. The blackmailer who forces something out of somebody by playing on the victim's virtues does not do himself any good in the long run.
Surely, that is what the other side are doing to this side on this occasion. It is not doubted on the other side that the Opposition are extremely unwilling to do anything which might hinder or even seem to hinder the process of rearmament. That is the fulcrum or the lever that is being used in order to compel the Opposition to swallow what the Lord President well knows is a great deal more than the Opposition could bring itself to swallow if it were not limited partly by that Pickwickian blackmailing action on his part and partly by Parliamentary procedure, by the way this thing is being done today. That really gives us a right for resentment in this matter, and a right to try to appeal to the Lord President's better feelings, if he has any, that really he ought not to do the business he is doing this evening by rather jauntily indicating, "Boys, I am going to get away with it for a year, and on another occasion there will be a chance of getting away with it for longer.
We ought to be given some assurance that there is some indication in the long run—and not in too long a long run—of getting away from this kind of thing. We were nearly told by the Lord President, and we were told in very great detail by the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), that the real


point is that this is the way in which the changeover is to be made from an individualist to a semi-individualist, a semi-Socialist society, and then to a complete Socialist society, and one from which we could not get back—that that is the object of using regulations in this way.
The Lord President came near telling us that by implication and the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne told us that in very great detail. I say it is not decent that that should be done under the pretence of an immediate patriotic urgency which no Opposition could decently question or criticise. That is really the case which it is necessary for them to meet.
Before I sit down, there is one very small point of which the returned Lord President has reminded me. Surely his argument about the United States is not fair. He says, "Look at the United States. They have had to go back to delegated legislation and government by regulation, and so on." But the whole difference is that in the United States the Executive has not always a majority of the legislature at its command whereas in this country it has, and that is why in this country it can trust to get the direct legislation that may be necessary when it wants it immediately, as it has done in the past.
Really, I do think it is open to doubt that His Majesty's Government are here asking for more powers than what, if we had the time and if there were Committee stages, they would then admit were more than, they expect to need. If that is true, then it is asking for more powers than any Government ought to be given. Secondly, there is no doubt that the Government are asking for powers based on patriotic necessities which they really do not need for those necessities, but need for the establishment of what they believe to be an irreversible Socialist State. If those things are so, then the Government owe it to us at least to give us some assurances about what is meant to be done when this present year period now being asked for comes to an end.

6.56 p.m.

Mr. Donald W. Wade: I wish briefly to refer to some of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) and by the hon. Member for Wallsend

(Mr. McKay). I do not propose to follow all the arguments of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne, and I respectfully suggest that some of them were not entirely relevant to the subject we are discussing this evening. I am most anxious to point out what I believe to be the issue that we are debating tonight. For example, the hon. Member for Wallsend referred to certain regulations dealing with industrial disputes. I should like to debate that. I think there are flaws in the existing law, but surely they could be dealt with by legislation. That is not in itself an argument for legislation by regulation.
Again, the real issue is not whether or not we are in favour of getting rid of controls. The words which the Lord President used were, I think, "getting rid of controls for the sake of getting rid of them." That is not what we are debating, we are debating the best method of legislation. If I might quote from the Motion standing in the names of my right hon. and hon. Friends, including myself, the words we use are:
to legislate by regulation without prior reference to Parliament.
I suggest that is the issue, and not the question whether or not there should be controls, although I should be delighted to debate that, as, I am sure, would my hon. Friends, on a suitable occasion.

Mr. S. Silverman: Does the hon. Member mean that he and his hon. Friends would be perfectly satisfied provided all the regulations were introduced by way of affirmative Resolution? In that way there would be prior consultation of Parliament, and if that is the only point in which hon. Members opposite are interested, then it could be fully met by having an affirmative Resolution every time.

Mr. Wade: I cannot accept that, because the hon. Gentleman has not referred to the question of Amendments, to which I shall come in a moment.
Secondly, it is not a question of whether there should be economic planning or not. That, also, we would willingly debate. The point is who should do the planning. I remember many years ago taking part in a debate with a young lady Socialist who had passionate faith in Socialism and spoke of the day when everything would be planned by the people. But it is


becoming more and more clear that the planning is not by the people. More and more, the planning is by the Executive, over which the people have less and less direct control. The point is, who should do this planning?
Thirdly, it is not a question of the time factor. It may be said that six weeks are inadequate time in which to introduce legislation if these powers are not granted, but it has never been suggested to us that, if these powers are granted, they would be only temporary and that in future, when the need arises for this or that change in the law, it would be introduced by legislation. Therefore, the time factor cannot be fairly used in answer to arguments from this side of the House.
Fourthly, it is right that we should consider the subject matter with which these powers deal. Reference has been made to the Control of Engagement Order. Surely we could deal with that by legislation. I repeat that that really is the issue. The hon. Member for Nelson and Colne suggested that it might be advantageous if the House had power to make Amendments when these regulations are laid before it. He is very anxious to take matters to their logical conclusion. He made a debating point on that line of following the Liberal view to its logical conclusion. If we follow his argument to its logical conclusion, what is the difference between allowing Amendments to be put forward, Amendments to Amendments and so forth, and introducing legislation? If we follow that line to its logical conclusion, I suggest that we reach our Liberal conclusion that it is better to legislate than to introduce regulations.
I was very concerned with the phrase used by the hon. Member for Wallsend that what we believed in the past we do not necessarily believe in the present. That may be so, but to use the expression "progressive scale of change" is dangerous. It is a change in the wrong direction, a change in the direction of legislation by the Executive without reference to the House. It is on that matter of principle that this evening we make the protest that certainly needs to be made.

7.3 p.m.

Mr. Eric Fletcher: I only intervene towards the end of this rather long Debate because I think two

points still ought to be made from these benches. One of the fallacies into which the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Wade) has fallen, as also did the hon. Member for Carlton (Mr. Pickthorn), who spoke from the Conservative benches, is that they both tend to assume that those on the benches opposite are the only people interested in Parliamentary control over the Executive. That is a great fallacy.
On the general question I think the sense of the House is clear that it is essential that these regulations should be continued for at least another year. It would be an intolerable situation if they were not. The whole machinery of government would otherwise come to an end. It is quite apparent from the speeches that have been made that the main argument with which we are concerned is the theoretical question whether, by giving the Executive these powers, Parliament is surrendering some of our democratic rights. But it is necessary that the powers the Government now enjoy should be continued.
I remember perfectly well taking part in the Debate in 1945 when the Supplies and Services Act was passed. I remember making my maiden speech on that occasion, and I remember that a number of hon. Members on this side of the House expressed some concern that, in giving the Executive these powers, we should be quite sure we did not diminish the traditional control by Parliament over the Executive. One of the great achievements of the last Parliament was not merely that it carried through the exceptionally large volume of legislation for which it had been returned, but that, at the same time, it also managed to preserve in such a high degree our traditional Parliamentary control over the Executive.
The method of control over delegated legislation which we developed in the last Parliament is very remarkable. Throughout the whole of that Parliament and this Parliament I have had the honour of serving on the Select Committee on statutory instruments to which the Lord President of the Council paid a tribute. It is sometimes forgotten that that Select Committee is manned, as are all other Select Committees, by hon. Members drawn from both sides of the House, with a preponderance of hon. Members from this side


as being the Government party. That Select Committee looks at all statutory instruments—and there are several hundreds—quite dispassionately, as Members of Parliament.

Mr. Pickthorn: Not on their merits.

Mr. Fletcher: That Select Committee looks at all these statutory instruments with regard to form and, incidentally, with regard to merit. In case the hon. Member for Carlton has not appreciated it, I think it ought to be made known that a great many of the Prayers that have been put down by hon. Members opposite have emanated from criticisms made by the Select Committee on statutory instruments, on which members of my party have a numerical majority. In that sense I feel that this party is entitled to claim its full share of credit as serving in the capacity of watchdog for Parliament on the use by the Executive of the delegated functions which this House has entrusted to the Government.
I do not want to reiterate what my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne said when he pointed out what I think is now accepted, by the House and by the country, that delegated legislation is an essential part of the apparatus of government in modern conditions, and that our Parliamentary institutions are developing in accordance with the requirements of this period of transition. I believe that the method by which this adaptation of Parliamentary Control is taking place is welcomed by the country.
One other point. Hon. Members have said that, while they object in principle to the continuing of these regulations, they would not object to the substance of them if they were incorporated in legislation. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Well, many of them. I do not think anyone could deny that, given sufficient Parliamentary time, it may well be desirable that some of these regulations should be incorporated in statutory form. But that would require a great deal of Parliamentary time. I do not think anybody would suggest—not even the hon. Member for Northfield (Mr. Blackburn) who now sits on the opposite benches—that Parliamentary time devoted in the last Parliament to preparing measures of Socialism should have been devoted instead to putting these regulations in statutory

form. I hope the House will pass this Motion without a Division.

7.10 p.m.

Mr. Douglas Marshall: I venture to intervene at this late stage in the Debate, and my reason for doing so has already been stated by my hon. Friend the Member for Carlton (Mr. Pickthorn), who said that there are certain of us who feel extremely deeply about this question of the liberty of Parliament and giving greater executive power to the Government of the day, whatever that Government may be.
I could not follow the argument of the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher). As far as I could discover—I do not wish to misrepresent him—one of the things he appeared to be saying was that because more power was given to the Executive, that did not mean that we were giving up in any way the rights of Parliament. I do not agree with him. He then said that this is a period of transition. When exactly is a period not a period of transition? It must always be a period of transition. As for the question of emergency and all the rest of it, either a country is at war or it is at peace. We all appreciate that at the moment there is a desperate situation, but at the same time one can dwell too long on these points with regard to delegated legislation.
I thought the argument of the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow) was rather odd. He said, "It appears that hon. Members opposite"—referring to us on these benches—"would be content if all these powers were embodied in an Act of Parliament." I should like to correct that point. We would be content if these powers could be brought forward so that we could debate whether or not they should be embodied in an Act of Parliament; we have never said that all the powers should be embodied in an Act of Parliament. He then said, "Let us wait and see," suggesting that another hon. Member had said likewise. But this has been going on for 10 years already. For how long are we to wait and see? There is a limit to the time that we should wait in a matter of this sort.

Mr. Snow: On the first point, I have no quarrel with the hon. Member. If that is what he understood me to say, it is my fault for expressing myself badly.


I did not mean to imply the sum total of the existing regulations. On the second point, however, the hon. Member's interpretation was not really what I said.

Mr. Marshall: Could the hon. Member say what he did say?

Mr. Snow: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would repeat what he thought I said.

Mr. Marshall: I thought the hon. Member said that it might be a good thing—and the point had already been made by another hon. Member below the Gangway—to wait for a further period to see which powers should be embodied in legislation.

Mr. Snow: My contention was that it might be better with some of these controversial Measures to try them out on a year-to-year basis rather than have them embodied in an Act of Parliament, since the repeal procedure would take a long time.

Mr. Marshall: That proves my point, I think. We have already had 10 years of these regulations.
The Lord President made one point which I could not understand. He said. "Do not let us do this piecemeal." There may be substance in what he said, from his point of view, but I wish to treat them piecemeal. I should like each one of these regulations to come before Parliament so that we could debate them. The Lord President was kind enough to give way to me when he was referring to American legislation. I asked him whether it contained the same powers as are contained in Regulation 58A. His answer was that he was not suggesting that the powers were the same, but he was giving instances of certain powers which were similar. Surely it is over Regulation 58A that a great number of hon. Members feel extremely deeply. In Regulation 58A lies the control of man.
When we have debated the Control of Engagement Order in this House, again and again, in reply to hon. Members in all quarters of the House, the right hon. Gentleman who was replying has said, "Why are you arguing about this? Already you have passed it with Regulation 58A." I am sure that that is within the recollection of hon. Members who were in the last Parliament. Therefore, if a protest is not made on this occasion,

we shall once more be told that Regulation 58A has already been passed. I believe that in this emergency we cannot do anything but accept the Motion before us, but I do not like it; I do not like this rule by regulation. I detest Regulation 58A and I give notice that, although I will accept it now, I have no intention of continuing to accept it in this fashion, whatever Government may be in power.

7.15 p.m.

Mr. Blackburn: I think hon. Members in all quarters of the House have recognised throughout the Debate that great issues of freedom are involved in what we are doing today, and I was glad that the hon. Member for Carlton (Mr. Pick-thorn)—I hope he will forgive me for agreeing with him today—said that this is a battle that has been fought on many occasions in the past, not only against the Labour Government but against previous Governments. I should like to pay tribute to some of the battles which the present Minister of Health fought, even during the war, when he risked great unpopularity in fighting them. I believe the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) has once or twice been on the right side in this matter, although I would say, with great friendship to him, that he has been very much on the wrong side today.
I am greatly embarrassed in this Debate because the speeches from the Government Front Bench are being made by the Lord President of the Council and, I understand, by the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, to whom I tender my very sincere congratulations. But the real villain of the peace has scarcely ever been here. He is the Attorney-General who has once or twice poked his nose into the Debate and then disappeared. I have no doubt that he has very important duties to perform, but neither the Attorney-General nor the Solicitor-General has been present during the Debate except when the Attorney-General listened to the speech of the Lord President on which, no doubt, he had already advised. The people responsible for this are lawyers, and I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher) that I am not surprised that he supports these regulations, because they are a positive paradise for lawyers.
I beg the House to consider not merely the case of the large company and the small company but the case of the ordinary working man. The Minister of Labour himself had not the slightest understanding—and admitted it to the House—of the way in which Regulation 58A comes into effect. A working man receives a form and he may say, "What is the authority behind this form?" As a matter of fact, most of them do not ask that The Government get away with an enormous number of powers which they do not really possess. The working man looks at the form and is told that it comes under Regulation 58A. If hon. Members will turn to the blue book, which working men have not got, they will find that Regulation 58A is:
"S.R. & O. 1940 (No. 781) II, p. 31; amended: S.R. & O. 1940 (Nos. 828 and 907) II, pp. 36 and 49, S.R. & O. 1941 (Nos. 257, 1899, and 2052)"—
and so forth. I will not weary the House by reading any more. I invite hon. Members to look at it. It was then
continued in force with amendment under Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945.
Yet none of those are the authority under which Regulation 58A exists. The authority under which Regulation 58A exists is the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act, 1939. Really that sort of thing is not good enough, and it is time that this House decided that it was no longer going to put up with the inability of lawyers to enable ordinary people in this country to find out what the law is. That is the real issue which is raised in this Debate. I quite agree with the point which has been made that, as a result of this, we have very wide power which everybody admits to be far more than the power which is really necessary.
I am sorry the Home Secretary has left the Chamber, because I should have liked to give him a practical illustration of the advantages which might have accrued to him assuming that, instead of having power over direction of labour under seven different authorities, we had a specific Act of Parliament. If we had an Act of Parliament we should have very limited power of control of labour; and probably the party opposite and the trade union movement would have agreed only to a negative power over the direction of labour.
In fairness to the Government. I pay tribute to them for never having exercised the power of direction of labour which they took in 1947, and I must say that the Ministry of Labour have exercised the power in an excellent manner. I have no quarrel with them about that. But if we had a specific Act of Parliament, we might be able to deal with the rival gangs of thugs who are turning the City of London into an imitation of the City of Chicago, because most of them are British subjects born outside this country who engage in threats of acts of violence and live on immoral earnings; and we should have the power to deport undesirable people of that kind. That is a practical illustration of the point.
If we had an Act of Parliament considered by this House, we should be doing our proper job, giving the necessary powers—and here I answer the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne—giving the powers that are necessary and not giving powers that are unnecessary. I particularly ask the Government about this, as I believe I am only expounding Labour Party policy—I have no right to do so, but I believe I am only expounding Labour Party policy—because I recollect that the Labour Party did say that when they came into power they would introduce a revised Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Bill; and I believe that still to be the policy of the Labour Party.
The real question I want to ask the Home Secretary today is this. When do the Government intend to introduce normal peace-time legislation to which they have referred? It is so easy to say, "Well, the emergency continues." But what ought to happen is this. First, we ought to decide that we are no longer at war with Nazi Germany, and that Hitler and Co. died about five years ago. It is really ludicrous for the people of this country to be told, in effect, that we are still in 1939. I thought we had forgotten about that. I thought we were living in a new age. Secondly, we ought to have got peace-time legislation, giving to the Executive the power they need in a social democracy to maintain full employment and to enable fair shares to be made in times of shortage.
Then, over and above that, the Government, having done all that, should today come to the House and ask for


special emergency powers, because we are dealing with a special emergency. That is what should have been done. We should have finished with 1939 in 1947 or 1948, and then have had the permanent powers on the Statute Book for peacetime, as the Lord President of the Council himself has declared is the intention of the Government today. Over and above that, we should consider what emergency power are now necessary.
We should entirely divorce power over persons from power over property. It is utterly wrong to include in the same Act and in the same regulations power, on the one hand, to regulate the right of landowners owning hundreds of thousands of acres to use the land as they like, and, on the other hand, power—as there is power in the regulations—to produce concentration camps in Britain. I wish that point to be quite clear, because it was made in the last Parliament, and the Attorney-General eventually had to admit it.

Mr. S. Silverman: Where is there such power?

Mr. Blackburn: I will give the hon. Member the answer. I hope I am not wearying the House. [HON. MEMBERS: "Go on."] Under Regulation 58A the Minister of Labour has power to direct
… any person to perform such services … as may be specified … in the direction, being services which that person is, in the opinion of the Minister "—
that is no protection at all—
capable of performing.

Mr. Silverman: Concentration camps?

Mr. Blackburn: I am not saying that hon. Members opposite would, in any circumstances, do anything of the kind. I am merely saying the power exists. There is power there to direct the individual to perform such services as the Minister directs. There is power under Regulation 51 to requisition land for any purpose. The power exists under Regulation 51 and Regulation 58A combined to requisition land and to direct any working man of this country. I can assure my hon. Friend the power exists. It has been admitted by the Attorney-General already. Why on earth should a party like the Labour Party, which has resolutely set its face against totalitarianism of any kind, merely because of the idleness of lawyers—that is the reason: I

am not blaming the Lord President or the Chancellor of the Exchequer; it is because of the idleness of lawyers—not have a proper Act of Parliament?

Mr. Gaitskell (Chancellor of the Exchequer designate): Perhaps the hon. Member would also take account of the proviso to paragraph (2) of Regulation 58A.

Mr. Blackburn: It is rather long to read out. It says:
Provided that in determining the terms upon which any such services … regard shall be had to any rates of salary, fees or wages"—

Mr. Silverman: Do they have that in concentration camps?

Mr. Blackburn: If the hon. Member will read Communist propaganda he will read that it says that for forced labour in the Soviet Union some form of payment is always made.

Mr. Gaitskell: I really think the hon. Member should not be allowed to get away with the statement that Regulation 58A involves or might involve sending to concentration camps. He disregards altogether the carefully-worded proviso regarding the terms and conditions under which persons to be directed are to be employed.

Mr. Blackburn: I am sure the right hon. Gentleman is not trying to be unfair to me. I am not saying this involves the use of concentration camps. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I said quite specifically I did not think he or hon. Members opposite would have anything to do with them. I merely said the power exists. Everybody knows that it was always said that in Nazi concentration camps and in Fascist concentration camps—and that it is always said that in Communist concentration camps—some sort of payment is made. Payment should be made in these circumstances, too. However, I cannot continue this particular point any further.

Mr. Silverman: I think it is only fair to the hon. Gentleman himself to give him the opportunity to explain what he means, or else to withdraw the very remarkable statement he has made. He has said that this Regulation, combined with another one, gives the Government power to create concentration camps. This is really an outrageous charge.

Mr. Blackburn: Legal power.

Mr. Silverman: Yes, legal power. He admits that they would never do that. I accept that. We are asking him where it is that he says this power is given. I do not apologise for the length of this interruption at all. The proviso referred to says:
. . In determining the terms upon which any such services are to be performed regard shall be had to any rates of salary, fees or wages for the performance of those services which appear to be usual, and, in particular, in the case of services usually rendered under a contract of service, regard shall be had to any determination relating to the remuneration and conditions of service of persons employed in the district in the capacity and in the trade in which the person to whom the direction relates is to serve. …
Does the hon. Gentleman say that those are concentration camp conditions?

Mr. Blackburn: Really, I think the hon. Gentleman is advancing an argument which, on reflection, even he would not advance on this, because he knows perfectly well that under Regulation 58A the Minister of Labour may direct any person; and that subsequently regard is to be had to this, that or the other. But the courts of justice have no right to go behind the Minister's decision, and there is absolutely no doubt whatever that no court of justice in this country, once a direction had been made under 58A, would have the right to go behind the Minister's decision and inquire whether the Minister, in the exercise of his discretion, had had regard as provided in the proviso.

Mr. Silverman: The hon. Gentleman is wrong.

Mr. Blackburn: I am not wrong, and I can demonstrate that I am not wrong. In any event, the point was conceded by the Attorney-General himself in the 1947 Debate. I must not go into that any further, but I maintain that there is no doubt that under Regulations 58A and 51 legal power exists to create concentration camps, and I say that that power ought not to exist.
I do not desire to detain the House much longer, although I have been interrupted a great deal. The whole basis—which it seems to me some hon. Members opposite have not quite followed—of the main objection to what is being done today is that the difference between totalitarianism and democracy is that in time of peace totalitarians say, "We are at

war." That was the justification for what Hitler did in Nazi Germany. That is the justification for the continuance of the police State in the Soviet Union, and in support of that I quote Stalin's own essay in 1938 on the whittling away of the State.
Totalitarian States always say, "We require these tremendous powers because we are, in effect, at war. We are encircled by the capitalist Powers" or by the democracies, as Hitler said. It is vital that the social democratic movement of this country—which does not contain only members of the Labour Party—recognising the need for some permanent powers for economic planning in time of peace, should draw a great gulf between time of peace and time of war, and should lay down—and it would be a great thing if they did—the permanent peace-time forms of legislation which, allowing for some delegated legislation, would be able to provide a combination of a planned economy and freedom.
That is all I desire to say, except for this final remark. The great danger to freedom inside this country does not come from people who wish to impose any form of totalitarianism; it does not come from the Communists, or even from the ex-Nazis or the Nazis: it comes from the insidious growth of bureaucratic authority. It is interesting to me to discover, looking at the Government Front Bench today, that this House of Commons is increasingly becoming a House of Commons of exceedingly efficient people with Civil Service background. The Chancellor of the Exchequer designate and the Financial Secretary to the Treasury both have very great records in the Civil Service. We are in grave danger of being run by officials, and of moving into that managerial form of society of which James Burnham warned us.
I therefore very much hope that in replying the Chancellor will answer this question: When do the Government intend to fulfil what they said they would do in their election programme, and what I think they repeated at Margate—namely, introduce normal peace-time legislation for the purpose of dealing with the machinery of economic planning? When will they bring to an end the absurd system under which our people are ruled under an Act passed by Neville Chamberlain's Government in 1939?

7.34 p.m.

Major Legge-Bourke: I should like to follow the hon. Member for Northfield (Mr. Blackburn) on his last two points. In fairness to the Civil Service, we should bear in mind that if leading members of the Civil Service today were asked whether they liked delegated legislation, the great majority would say they did not; and I think that a great many would say that what they have regretted most over the last few years has been the increase in delegated legislation, the loss of anonymity in the Civil Service, and the increase in the executive powers of the Civil Service. I believe there is no section of the community that dislikes all those three things more than the more experienced members of the Civil Service. If this Debate has shown nothing else, it has shown that Members of Parliament feel the same way, and it is nice to think that there is that unanimity of view on this subject between both the politician and the civil servant.
There is no question that delegated legislation and Defence Regulations of this kind are bad—as my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford (Mr. Walker-Smith) so ably pointed out—for our constitution and for our parliamentary tradition, and I believe we should rectify the position as soon as possible. I was very interested in what the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow) had to say in advising the Government not to make permanent legislation of too many of these regulations too soon.
I wish to draw attention to a particular regulation with which I hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will deal in his reply. Perhaps I might be allowed to take this opportunity of congratulating him on his appointment, and also congratulating Winchester on the fact that His Majesty's Government seem to have adopted "'Party Manners' makyth man" as their motto. The regulation to which I refer is buried in lines 37, 38 and 39 of page 2271 of the Order Paper. It is one of those regulations brought in as a result of the Agriculture (Miscellaneous War Provisions) Act, 1939. My hon. Friend the Member for Carlton (Mr. Pickthorn) will remember this, because it concerns the great fenways which were built during the war, and which he played such a great part in bringing about. There is a regulation placing

responsibility for the maintenance of those roads upon internal drainage boards. Only one county is made an exception and that is the county of the constituency I represent.
The Isle of Ely has taken over all the roads, and they built them slightly wider than the regulation specified. The internal drainage boards have had to maintain those roads in other counties, and it is a growing burden which the drainage boards cannot by their rate hope to cover. I therefore hope that, if there is to be a regular annual review of these regulations, the Government, when next we consider them, will have done something about bringing forward new legislation so as to render that particular regulation unnecessary. I hope its form will be such that the county council road authority will be made responsible for these roads rather than that the internal drainage boards should have to continue that work.
I shall not detain the House any further, because the hour is late, but before sitting down, I should like to endorse everything said by my hon. Friend the Member for Bodmin (Mr. D. Marshall) about Regulation 58A. I have a deep loathing of that regulation, and I deplore the terrible repetition we have witnessed over the last few years of His Majesty's Ministers coming to this House and saying "We are asking for great powers, but we shall never use them, so please do not worry." That is not in accordance with the tradition of this nation. Over the years we have tried to ensure that all these matters are properly threshed out before they become a permanent part of our legislation, and I hope to see Regulation 58A eliminated as soon as possible.

7.39 p.m.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: This Debate has indeed covered a wide range, ranging from the Control of Engagement Order affecting the liberty of the individual to the question of drainage rates. That in itself is an indication of the extraordinarily wide sphere covered by the Defence Regulations and the masses of Orders which have been made under them. I must say that, having listened to almost all this Debate I think it is one of the best we have had since we have debated matters such as this while I have been a Member of the House.
I must admit that the speech of the Lord President, in moving this Motion, reminded me very strongly of the speech made by the then Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, in moving the Second Reading of the Emergency Laws Bill, in November, 1946. We had the same scanty references to a mass of regulations; the same pride being taken—I think the Home Secretary had done it before—in the number of Defence Regulations which had ceased to be in force, although I would point out that while the number is in itself important, what perhaps is more important is the effect of individual Defence Regulations.
Then we had from the Lord President the mere statement that there was an overwhelming case for the Defence Regulations and the powers of the Government under them being continued for a further year. He did not really try to make out that case. He went on to say that some of the powers under the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act would be permanently required. He did not specify which. It would have been very interesting indeed to have known, in view of the many statements which the right hon. Gentleman has made in the past, which are the powers given by the Defence Regulations which the right hon. Gentleman now thinks should be made permanent. I do not think that his silence on that has really been as helpful to the House as frankness would have been. I do not think that his exposition of his case for this Motion was one of his best efforts, although, perhaps, it was one of his most facetious performances. It does appear that the more serious the matter is, the more facetious and lightly the Lord President treats it.
The issue which we are discussing today is a very serious one. The real issue that divides the House can, I think, be quite shortly stated, although it was not correctly stated by the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman). It is not a question whether food rationing or sweet rationing shall stop on 10th December, but whether the powers that a Government of whatever colour must have in the circumstances of the day should be granted to them by Statute after a Bill has been fully considered in both Houses, and possibly amended,

defining precisely the powers of the Government, and with power, of course, for making some delegated legislation, or whether these powers should be taken by the Government to themselves by making regulations or orders on all kinds of things. That is the real issue—whether it should be rule by Regulation with wide powers taken by the Government of making laws on major matters, of making new criminal offences, indeed, of ousting the jurisdiction of the courts by imposing minimum penalties in some of the orders made under the Defence Regulations.
Our objection can be stated quite shortly. We believe that it is quite wrong in principle that we should have just an enabling Act and then power to legislate by regulation and order on matters of major importance affecting, as they so often do, the liberty of the subject. Our objection to this rule by regulation is that it gives far too much power to the Government and far too much freedom from Parliamentary control. It is quite true, as the Lord President said, that we cannot, by extending the Supplies and Services Act, add to the number of Defence Regulations, but there is no limit to the number of new orders that can be made under these Defence Regulations, and I think that it would be a most difficult task for any lawyer to find out what personal liberty and what individual right could not be taken away or diminished or infringed by some exercise by some Minister of his power of making a law under one of these Defence Regulations.
I think that it would be very hard to say that the powers now given do not cover nearly every aspect of human life on this island. It is clear, too, that very much of what is contained in the Defence Regulations could be replaced by Acts of Parliament, by Statutes. I think that the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher) recognised that, as the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow) also recognised it. The hon. Member for Islington, East, in his argument, asked whether it was suggested that the Government should have given up preparing measures of Socialism between 1945 and 1950 in order to adhere to the constitution by making laws by Acts of Parliament. Food rationing could be brought in under Act of Parliament and so could Control of Engagement. Nearly everything that could be done by Defence


Regulations or under them could be done, could it not, if an Act of Parliament were passed to that effect?
Of course, it is much easier and much less trouble for Ministers to act by making an order under a Defence Regulation, but it is not, I think, because they think that it is just easier and less trouble. Judging by their pre-war writings and judging by the Lord President's speeches, it seems to me clear that it is the desire and intention of those at the summit of the Socialist Party, notwithstanding their weekend lip-service to democracy, to disregard and by-pass, so far as they can, the democratic institutions of this country and to retain for themselves almost dictatorial powers.
It is curious to reflect that if the Lord President had had his way, we would have had now a Bill replacing the present Supplies and Services Act and making that Act, not something quite different, a permanent feature of our statute law. If that had happened, we would have had this curious situation. The more Socialists there were in the House of Commons, the less power the House of Commons would have had, because the right hon. Gentleman, with such a Measure, would take it away from the House of Commons.
It is our view that major matters should have to be dealt with by law and be contained in a Statute and not in Ministerial orders. It cannot be denied that a great deal of replacement could have taken place between 1945 and now. On unlawful gaming, the regulation in relation to that would not require a very long Bill. As to the regulation dealing with clubs, I think that we were promised some legislation about that. Then there is the Defence Regulation dealing with dogs straying on allotments. If that requires to be retained, surely that regulation could have been replaced by Statute. Then there is the regulation suspending the restrictions on the keeping of pigs and hens; the same would apply.
This Supplies and Services Act has been described by the right hon. Gentleman as the essential basis for economic planning and control. I do not know whether that applies to the regulation concerning stray dogs. We have certainly had plenty of controls: economic planning, groundnuts, petrol rationing, the fuel shortage of 1947 and the present fuel position. Those, I suppose, are instances of Socialist

economic planning. We maintain that, wherever possible, economic planning introduced by the party opposite should be contained in and defined by an Act of Parliament, and that rule by regulation should be diminished to deal with minor matters.
There is one particular question with which I should like the Chancellor to deal, as I think it is one on which some further explanation is required. Some reference was made by the Lord President to the extension of the requisitioning provisions. I need hardly say how much that will adversely affect many people. I understand that there are now something like 90,000 requisitioned dwellings held by local authorities, which must mean that 90,000 owners of property are being kept out of their properties, and that there are 2,000 requisitioned properties formerly used for dwelling accommodation that are now being used by Government Departments for other purposes. The extension of the requisitioning provisions form one of the more serious features of this Motion, and it shows as clearly as anything can the failure of the Socialist housing policy.
The Select Committee on Estimates, in their 11th Report of 1948–49, stated that the county committees were to let as much as possible of the land which they held under requisitioning, and should decide what land was to be purchased and de-requisition the remainder by the end of 1950. That statement was, of course, based on evidence, which was not disputed, given before the Committee. As a result of the extension of Defence Regulation 51, coupled with the Requisitioned Lands and War Works Act, the power to hold on requisition extends until the end of 1953. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to say whether or not this extension means any alteration in the policy of the county agricultural executive committees relating to the de-requisitioning of the remainder of the lands which have not been let or purchased. It is desirable that the right hon. Gentleman should say something about that to make the position clear.
Many Members have commented on the fact that the Motion is so framed that no Amendment can be made to it, either by limiting the extension to a shorter period, or by omitting certain Defence Regulations, with the result that the


choice before the House is either of rejecting the Motion outright, or agreeing to the extension for 12 months. I entirely endorse the remarks made from this side as to the Parliamentary tactics adopted by the Lord President in regard to this matter. It should have been quite possible for the party opposite to introduce legislation to make permanent those parts which require to be made permanent.
The House should not be placed in this position, but, while I am opposed to unnecessary rule by Regulation and regret that the Government have not done what they should have done instead of wasting time on unwanted and unnecessary legislation much as I detest giving the Government such wide power, it must be recognised that it is impossible, between now and 10th December, to provide for food rationing and other things of that kind by legislation. Therefore, it would be quite wrong, in my opinion, for us to oppose the Motion, also having regard to the international situation.
But I reiterate what has already been said, that this Act will come up for further consideration in a year's time, and that the sifting process must go on in the interval to see, where it is intended to make Regulations permanent, that opportunity is taken to give them statutory effect. We shall certainly watch closely the exercise of these extensive powers, and, in the unlikelihood of right hon. Gentlemen opposite occupying their same position at this time next year, I warn them that, unless the situation has much deteriorated, they will not get a similar Motion so easily as they are getting the one today.

7.52 p.m.

Mr. Gaitskell (Chancellor of the Exchequer designate): I should like to thank those Members who have been so kind as to congratulate me on being appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. Anyone who finds himself in that position must be filled with deep feelings of humility at the immensity of the trust that is being reposed in him and the responsibilities which fall upon him. In my case, these feelings are accentuated by the great qualities of my predecessor. Much has already been said in tribute to him, and I wish only to add that those of us who have worked most closely with him know how very deeply we shall miss him in

the Government, and how much the country will lose by his enforced and, as we hope, temporary departure. We cannot afford for long to miss the services of a man of his intellectual and moral calibre.
We have had an interesting Debate that has ranged fairly widely. The issue with which we are concerned is, in itself, a fairly narrow one—whether or not we should continue these powers for a period of a further year. I confess to one surprise. I had supposed that the Conservative Party were opposed to permanent legislation of this kind. We were certainly led to expect, from what the Leader of the Opposition said during the Election, that the Conservative Party took the gravest exception to permanent powers at this time being given to Ministers. But now, I gather, not only from what the hon. and learned Member for Northants, South (Mr. Manningham-Buller) said, but from what other Members opposite have said, that that is not so, and they want to see these powers made permanent.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman should begin by misunderstanding the speeches which have been made. We have said, and the Leader of the Opposition has said, that the Supplies and Services Act must not be made permanent, but that where Defence Regulations are intended to be made permanent, a Bill should be introduced for the purpose.

Mr. Gaitskell: The fact remains that the powers enshrined in the Act are to be granted permanently to Ministers. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] At any rate, a substantial number of them. I realise that the hon. and learned Member seems to be more interested in the powers to keep stray dogs off allotments than in the powers to keep prices down. I should have thought he would have hesitated to remove the latter power from the hands of the Ministers. We have not had a clear line from the Conservative Party as to which powers they think Ministers should permanently retain. I suggest that they had better get their minds clear on this before they go much further.
We are not concerned today with this question of permanent legislation. We are concerned with the temporary situation, the question of whether we shall have an extension for the period of


another year. As I understand it, the Opposition accept that that must be so. The Conservative Opposition quite willingly accept it, the Liberal Opposition, now a little more united than usual, not quite so willingly. There is to be no Division on this Motion. The reason why there is to be no Division, as put forward by the Opposition spokesman, is the defence situation and the rearmament programme. It is perfectly true that that is one of the main reasons why we have come to the House and said, "We must have these powers for at least another year," but it is by no means the only reason why we ask for these powers, and I should like to explain briefly why that is so.
Firstly, I must say a few words about the implications of the defence programme so far as these controls are concerned. All of us recognise, for example, that the requisitioning of properties and chattels of various kinds may be necessary in connection with the defence programme. One thinks of the various cases where it might be necessary to requisition machine tools, which might otherwise be exported to countries behind the Iron Curtain. The Opposition are in favour of that. One thinks of the necessities that might arise for requisitioning ships or cargo space, for requisitioning land for carrying out the necessary works in connection with the defence programme. That clearly is necessary.
Obviously control over raw materials will also be needed. I do not know how extensively that would be the case, but I can take two examples. There is at the present time a fairly serious shortage of sheet steel, and a fairly serious shortage of softwood timber. Clearly it is essential that in both these cases we should have powers to ensure that the firms that need these materials for armament purposes get them in the measure which is necessary. That cannot be done without control of raw materials and, therefore, it is necessary that there should be an extension of these particular powers.
Then again there is the question of building licensing, under Defence Regulation 56A, to which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Hertford (Mr. Walker-Smith) referred. It is clear enough that one could not possibly give the necessary priority to building for defence purposes

unless one had that licensing power. We shall use that power in the localities where building for defence purposes is necessary in order to put those defence works at the head of the queue, and ensure that they get the necessary priority. One could go on and take any number of other examples.
As I have said, while that is one of our main arguments in putting forward these proposals now it is certainly not the only one. In addition to the necessity for completing as rapidly as possible the building up of our defences, we have also to think of the main objectives in present circumstances. The first is to prevent inflation, and, secondly, to ensure that the improvement in our balance of payments position continues; in other words, that we continue to pay our way as a nation. I contend that the controls we are asking to continue are just as important for those purposes as they are for the defence programme.
I cannot follow the argument of those hon. Gentlemen opposite—not I think the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) and the hon. and learned Member for Northants, South, who spoke for the Opposition—but other speakers, particularly the hon. Member for Renfrew, West (Mr. Maclay), the leader of the National Liberal Party, who drew a sharp distinction between the necessities of defence and the economic situation. On the subject of defence we speak about the common interest. Everybody agrees that national defence is a common interest, but nobody agrees about the economic position. I would have thought it was fairly commonly agreed that it was desirable to prevent inflation and also to secure a balance of payments, and if possible earn a surplus.
If that is not so, hon. Members opposite should make their position plain about inflation. The first control in that connection is that of price control, covered partly by these particular regulations and partly by the Goods and Services (Price Control) Act. I should not have thought that hon. Members opposite, who are so fond of talking about the dangers and disadvantages of the rising cost of living, would have been anxious to throw away these powers of control by price and, therefore, on this ground they should welcome a continuance of these powers.
The argument can be further extended by arguing that if price control is to be effective, then the necessity arises to have a utility scheme of one kind or another. Anybody who has any experience of this, as my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade can confirm, knows the great difficulty of controlling prices unless there are fairly clearly stated articles. It was one of the main purposes of the utility scheme during the war to ensure that there were such articles, that the price was fixed, and at the same time that the quality was guaranteed. Under Defence Regulation 55, we are able to administer a utility scheme and so secure price control.
Equally one could argue this—and there have been discussions about it—on the subject of rationing. It is an essential concomitant to prevent an increase in price, and it is obvious enough that if there is still scarcity then, if there is no rationing, sooner or later prices will rise through a black market or other means. Therefore, these powers are needed for that purpose. Control over building is an essential element in the control of investment, and there again we have to prevent inflation. In the field of the balance of payments much the same thing applies.
We are very delighted with the performance of the motor vehicle industry. It has done magnificently in raising the level of its exports. It was possible only because we deliberately cut down supplies to the home market, and unless we had said to the industry, "If you do not get your exports up then we shall have to give you a direction or cut off your steel supplies," it might not have happened. The power to do that has been in the background, though, happily, we have not had to use it to any great extent.
My right hon. Friend referred to the question of pottery. We have been obliged to ensure that all the output of decorated pottery should go to the export market. There is no doubt at all that in the United States there is a large unsatisfied demand for decorated pottery. Again, if we had not had the power to do that we would not have had the exports going into the dollar areas in the way they have. The case made out by my right hon. Friend is overwhelming. We need these powers not only on the

grounds of defence, but on broad economic grounds. I am not arguing for the moment whether these powers should be permanent or not. That is a matter we can discuss on some other occasion.
The Liberal Party in particular have been most vehement opponents of this Motion and the most severe critics of the Government today. For that reason I should like to ask them whether they agree with what I have put forward. Are they seriously contending that we should abolish all these controls? If so, are they prepared to face the consequences or not? What, for example, is their attitude to the action of the United States recently in re-imposing all these controls? Do they really regard it as a matter of complete indifference whether we have these controls or not? I do not think it has been clearly answered from them this afternoon. I should like to refer to the brilliant speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), which I think shed a very vivid light on the confusion which still remains amongst the three Liberal Members still sitting on the benches opposite.
Of course, if they oppose these controls then they are logical in opposing the Motions, but then they must accept the consequences for our defence programme and for our economic affairs. If, on the other hand, they want the controls—and here, I expect, is the point where they will disagree most fiercely—then they must accept the need for delegated legislation. It is a practical impossibility to have these controls operating properly without delegated legislation, and it is quite out of the question to have all the instruments enshrined in what I must describe as normal legislation as contrasted with delegated legislation. Therefore, the logical argument is perfectly plain; if they accept the need for controls they must accept the need for delegated legislation.
Now it is said by various hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Kingston - upon - Thames (Mr. Boyd -Carpenter), "Yes, you must have delegated legislation but you need not have it in quite this form." We are not arguing about that at the moment. There may be something to be said for that point of view but, as the hon. Member will recognise, there are two kinds of stages between the extreme of no delegated legislation


and the other extreme where, as one hon. Member said, "We give all powers to the Government in a single sentence and leave them to do everything else by orders." We cannot this afternoon discuss exactly where, between those two extremes, we rest.
All I would say on that is that we must be realistic about the question of whether delegated legislation, such as we know it today, involves either real hard ship on individuals or a serious inter ference with the liberty of the subject. I must confess that some hon. Members seem to me to be almost hysterical on this subject, and not with any good reason—

Mr. Blackburn: If the right hon. Gentleman will allow me to interrupt, surely he will remember that in 1929 a committee was appointed to consider that subject. I hope he will not set his face against the possibility of a repetition of that, 21 years afterwards.

Mr. Gaitskell: I am not concerned with discussing the extremely complex problems necessarily involved in that. We should need a separate day for such a discussion. I want to make these few points. First, do not let us get into the habit of imagining that in reality all the delegated legislation we have had has meant serious hardship or interference with personal liberties. I do not believe it has for a moment.
It is quite true that the negative resolution procedure does not give precisely the same degree of control as a Bill going through Parliament. However, I would point out to the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames, who made considerable play with this, that on the one hand a very large number of these orders are of minor, even trivial importance. They are not really opposed by anybody, they are accepted, granted the necessity of controls, as an inevitable feature of them. That is the reason why no Prayers are ever made against them. On the other hand, on major issues such as petrol rationing and bread rationing, we certainly have major debates. Therefore, there is a large measure of Parliamentary discussion and debate when the issues are really important.

Mr. Walker-Smith: But no amendment.

Mr. Gaitskell: I concede that and it is, of course, a disadvantage in certain respects. On the other hand, one has to face the difficulties necessarily involved in allowing amendments to orders. Is there to be a Second Reading stage, a Committee stage, a Report stage, a Third Reading stage? If so, how much time will it take up? Will it be practicable in those circumstances to carry on with the necessary planning that we have this afternoon all agreed is necessary to some extent?

Mr. Walker-Smith: The right hon. Gentleman is looking at me. Is he inviting an answer? If so, I would suggest that if the Defence Regulations are to be kept, they should be cast in statutory form and have the full legislative procedure. The orders arising thereunder would not have the full legislative procedure but would be capable of Amendment in a single instance.

Mr. Gaitskell: I want to make the point generally. One cannot have such a Parliamentary procedure as will frustrate the whole purpose of these controls. That is the real issue. Subject to that, there is everything to be said for ensuring as much Parliamentary control as possible. I was glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher) intervened on that point. We on this side of the House are equally concerned with the rights of Parliament as against, not the bureaucracy—I think that is a most unfair implication against the Civil Service—but against other necessary and inevitable tendencies—the necessity to establish and maintain controls not only in economic but in other affairs. We cannot brush this aside by saying we must have no delegated legislation, that we must restore the sovereign rights of Parliament and ignore, what is, after all, something that has been happening over a long period of years and is an inevitable feature of, one might almost say, a more advanced industrial civilisation.
So I say, while we should certainly watch the rights of Parliament, we must not clog the machine. We must recognise the practical needs of the present. The practical needs of the present have not been questioned this afternoon. That being so, I think the case for passing this Motion is overwhelming clear now, and I hope the House will proceed to do so.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: Before the right hon. Gentleman sits down, will he deal with the point I asked him to deal with, with regard to the policy of the county agricultural committees in derequisitioning land?

Mr. Gaitskell: There is no change in the policy there. The extension of the regulation does not involve any change in policy. There were many thousands of separate pieces of land under requisition and it takes time to sift each case, but no time is being lost in dealing with them.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Before the right hon. Gentleman finally sits down, is he not proposing to deal with the continuation of Regulation 58A and, in particular, with the argument that if labour controls are ever to be reimposed, they should be reimposed by statute?

Mr. Gaitskell: I have nothing to add to what my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council said on that matter. We recognise perfectly well that this is a matter of rather exceptional importance as compared with other regulations, because it involves an interference

with the individual person and the individual subject. However, I must say this: I could not honestly and conscientiously say that within the next 12 months it is quite out of the question that we should need to make orders under this regulation. The reason for it, of course, would be in connection with the defence programme. We have no present intention of making any such orders—my right hon. Friend made that clear—but since there is the possibility which one cannot ignore altogether, we feel that the regulation must be left in its present form.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Why not do it by statute?

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under section eight of the Supplies and Services (Transitional Powers) Act, 1945, praying that the said Act, which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one.

To be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

DEFENCE REGULATIONS (CONTINUANCE)

Motion made, and Question proposed,

5
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under section seven of the Emergency Laws (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1947, praying that the Defence Regulations specified in the Schedule hereto, which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one.


SCHEDULE


Defence (General) Regulations, 1939



Regulation two BA (Control of explosives).


10
Regulation sixteen (Stopping-up or diversion of highways for purposes of open-cast coal and generating stations).



Regulation twenty AB (Amendments of National Registration Act, 1939).



Regulation thirty-three (Exemption of certain women from Acts relating to midwives).



Regulation forty-two CA (Unlawful gaming parties).


15
Regulation forty-five A (Issue of identity cards to seamen).



Regulation fifty (Power to do work on land).



Regulation fifty-two (Use of land for purposes of H.M. forces).



Regulation fifty-five C (Restrictions on registration of new clubs).


20
Regulation sixty C (Amendment of s. 4 of Sale of Food (Weights and Measures) Act. 1926).



Regulation sixty CC (Power of officers of Post Office to require production of identity cards).



Regulation seventy-six (Handling and conveyance of ammunition etc. in ports).



Regulation eighty-two (False documents and false statements).


25
Regulation eighty-three (Obstruction).



Regulation eighty-four (Restrictions on disclosing information).



Regulation eighty-five (Entry upon and inspection of land).



Regulation eighty-seven (Permits, licences, etc.).



Regulation eighty-eight (Fees for permits, licences, etc.).


30
Regulation eighty-nine (Use of force in entering premises).



Regulations ninety to ninety-three and ninety-five to one hundred and five (which contain general, administrative, legal and supplementary provisions).



The Third Schedule (Manner of instituting proceedings).


Other Defence Regulations


35
Regulations seventeen E and twenty of the Defence (Administration of Justice) Regulations, 1940.



Parts I, II, III and IV, Regulations twenty-one, twenty-five A, twenty-six, twenty-eight A, twenty-nine and thirty, and Schedules I, II, III and VI of the Defence (Agriculture and Fisheries) Regulations, 1939.


40
The whole of the Defence (Agriculture and Fisheries) (Northern Ireland) Regulations, 1940.



Regulations one, two, three and six of the Defence (Armed Forces) Regulations, 1939.



Regulation one and paragraphs (4) to (10) of Regulation five of the Defence (Burial, Inquests and Registration of Deaths) Regulations, 1942.


45
Regulations one and three of the Defence (Industrial Assurance) Regulations, 1943.



Regulations one and two of the Defence (Parliamentary Under-Secretaries) Regulations, 1940.



Regulations one and two and paragraphs (3), (4) and (5) of Regulation three of the Defence (Patents, Trade Marks, etc.) Regulations, 1941.


50
The whole of the Defence (Sale of Food) Regulations, 1943.



The whole of the Defence (Trading With the Enemy) Regulations, 1940.



The whole of the Defence (War Risks Insurance) Regulations, 1940, the Defence (War Risks Insurance) (No. 2) Regulations, 1940, the Defence (War Risks Insurance) (No. 4) Regulations, 1940 and the Defence (War Risks Insurance) Regulations, 1945.


55
The whole of the Defence (Women's Forces) Regulations, 1941."—[Mr. H. Morrison.]

8.20 p.m.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 10, to leave out Regulation sixteen (Stopping up or diversion of highways for purposes of open-cast coal and generating stations).
I am sure the Home Secretary will recognise this issue because we have dis-

it before, although it was some time ago and I expect he is still occupying the same position on the Council for the Preservation for Footpaths and Highways, and things of that sort. I make no apology for raising the question of the retention of this Defence Regulation again tonight. I do so for the reason that there are ample powers, both under


the old Highways Act and the Quarter Sessions procedure and new powers under Section 49 of the Town and Country Planning Act for closing highways where that is necessary to be done.

This regulation, which was altered slightly in 1946, gives power to the Minister of Fuel, if he considers it necessary for the purpose of working opencast coal or constructing or extending an electricity generating station, to order the stopping up, or diversion of the highway. I ask the Government whether it is really now necessary to retain the regulation in that form. When we last discussed it I was given an assurance that where any permanent stopping up was to be done it would be done by Act of Parliament. The then Under-Secretary of State to the Home Department said that on 26th November, 1947. The stopping up of a highway for an electricity generating station is not likely to be of a temporary character, nor is it likely to be something which has to be done in a great hurry, because the plans for an electricity generating station will take a year, or it may be two years, to prepare.

Therefore, I fail to see any reason why this Defence Regulation should be retained, in the first place dealing with electricity generating stations, when the Government have power both under the Town and Country Planning Act and the Highways Act to secure the stopping up of a highway and a footway if that be necessary. It seems to be a duplication and it is a duplication which also deprives individuals of the right of making their protestations. If it goes under the Town and Country Planning Act it has to be approved by the Government and, in the course of approving development for a generating station, the matter of a highway which is to be extinguished can be taken into account. Therefore, I contend that at any rate as far as electricity generating stations are concerned, the retention of this power by the Minister of Fuel and Power is really unnecessary and I ask him to say that it will be given up.

In regard to working opencast coal—which I thought was to draw to a conclusion fairly soon—there may be a case for a temporary closing of a footpath and re-opening when the fuel has been extracted, but, in view of the assurance given

by the Under-Secretary in 1947, I ask on how many occasions since 1947 use has been made of this Defence Regulation and whether in fact any use of it has been made for closing a footpath or highway in connection with an electricity generation station. I hope I have made the point clear and I think the onus is on the Government to satisfy us that this Defence Regulation is really necessary.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I beg to second the Amendment.
I cannot see that there is any case for the retention of this power as far as generating stations are concerned. No one knows better than the Parliamentary Secretary how long it takes to erect or extend a generating station. There can be no conceivable urgency for stopping up a highway in connection with it and, therefore, there can be no possible argument for doing it otherwise than by the normal procedure.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Fuel and Power (Mr. Robens): There is a good deal in the case put forward by the hon. and learned Member for Northants, South (Mr. Manningham-Buller) and seconded by the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter). In point of fact this regulation is being used in only one case. That is the case of Stewart Street Power Station, Manchester, and in six months' time, when that is completed, this regulation so far as electricity power stations are concerned can be dispensed with.

Captain Crookshank: Will it?

Mr. Robens: The hon. and learned Gentleman did concede the position in regard to opencast coal because of the problems of footpaths being opened again as speedily as possible, and it would not be possible to restore opencast sites if we had to go through all the procedure of making a new highway. I hope that on that understanding that we shall not use this regulation in another new case in relation to electricity power stations and only want to retain it in connection with opencast coalmining, I hope the hon. and learned Member will withdraw the Amendment.

Captain Crookshank: I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman means that the power can be withdrawn or does he mean that it will be withdrawn? The two words do not mean the same thing.

Mr. Robens: The intention was that it would be dispensed with.

Captain Crookshank: Then it will be withdrawn. Even so, could the hon. Gentleman go a little further and say when this Stewart Street, Manchester, power station came into the picture? It is quite definite that my hon. and learned Friend was assured in 1947 that this procedure would never be used when there was a case of a permanent alteration—or was it subsequent to 1947? Is this a temporary one, I am not quite clear?

Mr. Robens: No, it is not a temporary one, but it started out as a temporary one and subsequently the local authority felt it would be better that that street should be closed and another highway made which would be more suitable. In consequence, whilst this has been going on, the local authority have been constructing a new highway to take the place of Stewart Street so that in that case Stewart Street will be permanently closed, but a new highway will be available. It would be quite correct, as the right hon. Member suggested, that at the time it was not intended that it would be used for permanent closing of a street but only subsequently when the local authority looked at this and realised the complications, it was decided to make it permanent. But it will not be used again for an electricity power station.

Captain Crookshank: I can quite see that and I am sorry to cross examine the hon. Gentleman, but the assurance was quite definite
that where it was intended that temporary stopping up should become permanent.
there must have been a moment of time when that was decided—
where it was intended that a temporary stopping up should become permanent, there could be no objection to using the normal procedure either under this Act or the old procedure of Quarter Sessions, and he is prepared to see that it will always be done."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th November, 1947; Vol. 444, c. 2008.]
But apparently it was not done and when assurances are given between Ministers and those who sit on these benches it is disturbing to find that even on one occasion this has not been carried out.
8.30 p.m.
There may be some explanation beyond this, and if there is the hon. Gentleman will no doubt communicate with us. Obviously we cannot at this stage go on cross-examining each other. It looks, on the face of it, as if a ministerial assurance was not carried out. As regards the future, it is very satisfactory to find that the Parliamentary Secretary does not anticipate that there will be any more cases and that in fact within six months or so this part of the regulation will be withdrawn.

Amendment negatived.

Captain Crookshank: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 12, to leave out Regulation twenty AB (Amendments of National Registration Act, 1939).
This Amendment is moved to raise the whole question of identity cards, which is a matter of real importance, because they seem to be, and as a matter of fact for many years past they seem to have been, completely useless. Their origin was a long time ago. They were a wartime expedient but even then it was admitted that, because of the fact that there was no photograph attached, and they could be easily forged, they were not really of very much value.
Then there came a time in the course of the argument when it was said that, "Of course, you would not be able to get your food ration card unless you could produce an identity card," and that as deserters from the Forces ex hypothesi would not have identity cards, and would not be able to get ration cards, the fact that they were deserters would emerge and they would be caught. While that may have been a tidy theory no one knows better than the Minister of Labour that it did not work out because there are still in this country thousands of men who are deserters, and who presumably have somehow had something to eat in the last four, five or six years. So that argument in favour of the identity card is not a very strong one.
As a matter of fact the Government have themselves repeatedly said that they do not think that there is very much use in them. The most recent quotation I have before me is an observation made as recently as 27th June last during the proceedings of the Standing Committee


on the Maintenance Orders Bill [Lords]. The Home Secretary then stated:
The National Register and the Identity Card are alien to the English way of life, and I hope also to the Scottish way of life."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee A, 27th June, 1950; c. 55.]
Presumably he meant to infer that the sooner we got rid of them the better.
I should like to know why we should continue this regulation and give this power. Perhaps I might, while speaking on this regulation, refer to another Amendment which I and some of my hon. Friends have put down really with the intention of calling attention to the same matter. It is in line 21, to leave out Regulation sixty CC (Power of officers of Post Office to require production of identity cards). If I do so now, we shall not have to speak separately on the subject. That Amendment to which I referred gives officers of the Post Office power to require the production of identity cards—they do not have to do so but they may ask for their production—when persons go to a Post Office and wish to draw money out of the Post Office Savings Bank. I suppose that procedure was adopted when more importance was attached to the value of identity cards than is now the case.
I remember that there had been a tremendous number of forged withdrawals from the Post Office Savings Bank, and judges and magistrates were particularly critical at the ease with which that could be done. This device was adopted as some safeguard. The records show a considerable drop of such forged withdrawals as a result of the introduction of the permitted use given to the Post Office counter clerks, if that is the only practical reason which anyone can produce today as to why identity cards are retained, it is out of proportion to what is achieved because the number of men and women who are employed looking after the National Register and the identity card system must mean a considerable expenditure to set against the possible forged withdrawals from the Post Office Savings Bank.
There might be other ways of guarding against such withdrawals. The step I have mentioned was adopted as a quick remedy at the time. If the Post Office were asked to address themselves to the question whether they could not think of

some other way of dealing with this risk, I am not sure whether even the production of a food ration card would not be equally good. Like the identity card, the ration book does not contain a photograph and it might just as well have been stolen as might an identity card. There are plenty of other possibilities.
We therefore raise the issue as to what these cards are really for today. The Home Secretary, like myself, does not think much of them. He thinks they are alien to our way of life. The occasions on which one is asked to produce them must be very few. I certainly have never been asked to produce mine to anybody, and I dare say that the normal run of law-abiding citizens are in the same position. On the other hand, any Government paper—if that is what we may call it—which ordinary people have to keep and look after is to many of them a great anxiety and worry. They wonder whether they have lost it, or where they have put it. All this may have been necessary at the time they were introduced, but, as I say, the original reasons are somewhat wrapped in obscurity.
I hope that justification can be made today for this regulation, and that, if not, the Government will say that this is the time to let it go. I do not expect that they will agree to let it go now, but perhaps, like the other regulation we discussed, we can get an assurance that it will be withdrawn within six months, which will be quite an advance on the present situation.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Blenkinsop): An odd thing about the speech of the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) is that although he was apparently moving the deletion of this particular regulation, I do not think he has actually said a word about it. He has, quite fairly, no doubt, spoken about the 1939 National Registration Act and quite naturally used this opportunity of inquiring of the Government about it; but I would point out that, in fact, the regulation makes certain minor modifications in that Act, and the right hon. Gentleman has not said a word about it, although he moved its deletion.
So far as the Act itself is concerned, it is true that on many occasions my right hon. Friend and other Members of the


Government have expressed their general dislike of this form of procedure, and this matter has been under consideration for some time; but it is a difficult problem, because in fact these identity cards do serve quite a number of useful purposes which would have to be served in some other way if the identity cards were to be withdrawn. For example, the Ministry of Food find them very useful indeed in connection with the issue of ration books. The Service Departments find them of value for some reasons already mentioned by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. Also, identity cards are found to be extremely convenient as an identifying factor in the National Health Service to check the lists of doctors, and they serve other purposes. If the National Registration Act were to be withdrawn at any time, we would have to find some other form of registration to take its place.
These are clearly matters that we have to consider, and I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that this matter is being very carefully considered by the Government. But we have to find some alternative way of collecting the information and making the checks that otherwise are effected by the use of our present identity card system. Not that we are particularly enamoured of the system as it stands. It is simply the practical problem of how we can ensure some efficient control by other means. I cannot, therefore, give any sort of undertaking about the future of this regulation which is a modification of the original 1939 Act, but I can say that the matter is under careful consideration by the Government.

Mr. Blackburn: The hon. Member will observe that under paragraph (4) these officers have the powers to ask for the production of an identity card and if that identity card is not produced an offence under the Act is committed. First, may I ask whether any prosecutions have taken place, and secondly, whether police officers are in the habit of taking advantage of paragraph (4) of Regulation 20?

Mr. Blenkinsop: I should explain that paragraph (4) is no extension of the powers provided in the 1939 Act. The regulation merely ensures that proceedings for failure to produce an identity card shall be taken in the locality where the original request to produce the card is made and not perhaps in some fardistant

part of the country, as was the position before this regulation was introduced. There have been proceedings. There is no extension of police powers in this regulation.

Mr. Blackburn: I am not dealing with the question of the 1939 Act. The right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) did not deal with the actual provisions of this paragraph. I assure the right hon. and gallant Gentleman that I believe it to be the practice of police officers in certain circumstances to go up to people and ask them for their identity cards. I am glad to see that the Minister nods his head. That is far more serious than the question of whether people should have identity cards or not. I can well imagine that it may be a good thing to have identity cards for the various purposes referred to by the Minister. That is one matter, but a much more serious matter is that there should be an obligation upon a citizen to carry an identity card, and that obligation is contained in paragraph (4) of Regulation 20 AB.
If a person has not got his identity card and he is asked to produce it, he is served with a notice. I know of people who have been served with a notice requiring them to produce an identity card. If they do not produce an identity card, is it the practice to prosecute? The Minister says that it is the practice. I submit that the matter becomes a little more serious. The fact is that, the Home Secretary himself having said that he dislikes the whole business of identity cards, nevertheless it is the practice of police constables in London in certain circumstances to ask people for their identity cards. If they do not produce their cards, apparently they are prosecuted.

Mr. Blenkinsop: If the hon. Gentleman will give way, the first thing I want to make clear—apparently he is still not clear about it—is that this power of the police officer to require the production of an identity card is a power which was included in the 1939 Act. It is not a new power provided by this regulation.

Mr. Blackburn: I appreciate that.

Mr. Blenkinsop: A moment ago the hon. Gentleman said that he was dealing purely with the regulation and not with the Act. Apparently, that is not so. As I understand the position, he is concerned


with the Act. It certainly can be the practice of the police to ask for the production of an identity card. They have done that in the past and undoubtedly it has been of great value to them to be able to do so. But clearly it is only when this state of affairs is linked with some misdemeanour that there is much likelihood of an actual prosecution taking place. Therefore, there is no reason at all why the hon. Gentleman should raise this matter at this stage. The whole question of the use of identity cards is one which is under consideration by the Government. This power to which the hon. Gentleman has referred is one which is part of the 1939 Act.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. Blackburn: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I cannot believe that the hon. Gentleman has been properly informed. I could give him details of a case in which somebody was approached. I am not authorised to give the details here, but I am prepared to give them in private to the Home Secretary. Somebody was approached by a police officer and questioned. It was decided that no charge would be preferred against the person concerned, but afterwards at his home a notice was delivered under paragraph (4) of Regulation 20AB requiring him to produce his identity card at a police station. I know that that is so, and I think the Home Secretary should give an undertaking—I think this matter is of some importance—that police constables will be told that, where they are considering preferring a charge against a person and later decide not to do so, they might then produce a form—they have a standard printed form—under Regulation 20AB requiring the person concerned to produce his identity card.
I ask for that statement from the Home Secretary because he quite rightly said that he does not like the whole business of identity cards, but I can accept the fact that they may well be necessary and convenient for certain purposes. What I am objecting to is that, on the face of it, in certain circumstances an offence is committed because a person is not carrying his identity card. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary at this very moment is not carrying his identity card.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Ede): indicated dissent.

Mr. Blackburn: I very humbly apologise to the Home Secretary, but I venture to suggest that most people in the House do not carry their identity cards, and certainly I have been asked to inquire whether the Attorney-General—

The Attorney-General (Sir Hartley Shawcross): Certainly, I have mine; it has a special colour.

Mr. Blackburn: I find myself that I have not got my identity card with me, but I think it will be agreed that it should not in any circumstances be regarded as an offence for people not to carry their identity cards, and I am merely asking the Home Secretary to give an undertaking that prosecutions will not take place against persons who are found not to be carrying their identity cards.

Mr. Ede: I do not detract in any way from what I said in June. I do not think that the carrying of identity cards is a thing which one would like to see made compulsory any longer than is necessary. With regard to what the hon. Member for Northfield (Mr. Blackburn) has said, after all, this works two ways. Sometimes, the production of an identity card will prevent the temporary arrest of a person while his address and identity are being checked, and I do not think it unreasonable that, if there is any doubt, a person should be asked to produce his identity card, and, if unable to do so, be given notice to produce it within two days to a police station, though not the station with which the police officer who served the notice is concerned.
I would certainly view with very considerable disfavour any oppressive use being made by the police of this system, and I should like to have particulars of the case to which the hon. Gentleman has alluded, because I am quite sure that no one would desire that the police constable should say, "Very well, we did not catch him on that; now, let us see if we can catch him on the other." That is not my experience of the way in which the police generally act.

Mr. Blackburn: I agree.

Mr. Ede: I am quite sure the police themselves would desire that any suggestion that one of their number has acted oppressively should be investigated.

Mr. Blackburn: I was not suggesting that in this case any oppressive action had been taken. As a matter of fact, the gentleman concerned did not produce his identity card, and no action was taken against him.

Mr. Ede: Then, what is all this fuss about? I gathered that it was a case where a prosecution had occurred. No? Then, I misunderstood the hon. Gentleman, but I am quite sure that a number of other hon. Members in the House gained the same impression. I am very jealous of the reputation of the police forces in matters like this. I know that the police themselves do regard with disfavour any breach of the standard they try to set of helping and protecting the good citizen in matters of this kind.

Mr. Blackburn: The reason I asked for an assurance on this matter was that when I asked earlier whether any prosecutions had occurred in respect of failure to produce identity cards, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health sitting next to the Minister nodded his head, as if there had been.

Mr. Ede: If there is a breach of the law, and a contumacious breach of the law, I could not then—

Mr. Blackburn: rose—

Mr. Ede: It might be contumacious in certain circumstances, and I am not going to give a general answer that might cover a particular case which even the hon. Gentleman might feel was one in which a prosecution ought to be undertaken. What I have said is that if the hon. Gentleman will give me the particulars of the case, which is very different from what I thought it was when he first mentioned it, I will have it investigated.

Mr. Blackburn: indicated dissent.

Mr. Ede: The hon. Gentleman said at first that he would give the particulars; now he nods his head in a negative fashion.

Mr. Blackburn: rose—

Mr. Ede: I declined to rise while the hon. Gentleman was speaking because I wanted him to develop his case fully. I have given way to him two or three times and he has only run away two or three times from the statements he made.

Mr. Blackburn: On a point of order. In view of the Home Secretary's accusation, may I say that when I sat down I thought the Home Secretary was interrupting. I gave way on the basis that I thought he wished to intervene.

Mr. Ede: I do not want to carry on this controversy, but after the hon. Gentleman sat down, I turned to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health and asked whether I should reply to that point, and there was a quite distinct interval of time. However, I will undertake to see whether any oppressive action has been taken. I will investigate any case brought forward, but I cannot give the police instructions that they should ignore breaches of the law.

Mr. Derek Walker-Smith: The regulation says that a person may be required to produce his card to such person and at such place as may be prescribed. Of course, if the person in question refuses to give any particulars about himself, obviously his convenience cannot be considered and should not be considered; but is it the practice, if a man has no identity card, and states where he lives, that the prescribed place is then one reasonably convenient to him?

Mr. Ede: I have made some inquiries into this, and I understand that the person is asked what police station would be the most convenient, or it is left to him to say where he will produce his identity card.

Amendment negatived.

Captain Crookshank: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 13, to leave out "Regulation thirty-three (Exemption of certain women from Acts relating to midwives)."
As one of my hon. Friends is going to speak to this Amendment I shall do no more than formally move the deletion of this regulation. Here, again, it was only to deal with an emergency. Supposing in a particular area there were insufficient midwives, then the local authority could make certain arrangements. One would presume that was due to the possibilities of disruption owing to evacuation or bombing. But time has gone on, and there have been a great many changes in the situation of midwives throughout the country, and, of course, there has been time for a number of them to be trained.
I do not know whether this was one of the original regulations—it was S.R.&O. 1939—and one would have thought that sufficient steps were now possible for regularising midwifery. Alternatively, if there is any need for some special provision for dealing with emergencies in the general run of things, then this is just one of the cases where we might consider taking it out of this body of regulations and making it a permanent statute.

Dr. Hill: I understand that the persons covered by this regulation are those who, under Section 5 of the Mid-wives Act, 1936, gave up practice, or who were required to give up practice with compensation. In general, they were a class of person whose experience was insufficient to enable them to justify their continuance as midwives, or who brought their experience to an end in return for compensation.
The period allowed for applications for compensation in return for relinquishing the midwives' certificate was three years. If action were taken under this regulation now, it would mean recognising as a midwife someone who had not practised midwifery for 11 years. If action has been taken under this regulation, then it has been specified in respect of such persons as have been recognised as midwives under it. It has been specified what conditions they shall observe and for what period.
The point I want to put specifically to the Parliamentary Secretary is whether, at the present time, there is any justification whatever for so diluting the midwifery service by the recognition of persons who, by the nature of things, cannot have had any experience as mid-wives or maternity nurses for 11 years. If the answer is that, of course, it is not proposed to exempt further persons, then the obvious question arises why the Amendment should not be accepted. If the answer is that its continuance is necessary, in order to continue the exemption of persons already covered by it, then I confess I find that difficult to understand, because of the reference to the conditions which have been attached to exemption. One thing that is needed, above all, is an assurance that this regulation will not be used for the purpose of recognising as midwives persons who gave up their certificates in return for

compensation and have not had experience in midwifery for 11 years.

Mr. Blenkinsop: I am glad to be able to clear up some of the difficulties in the mind of the hon. Member for Luton (Dr. Hill). As he rightly says, this arises out of the Midwives Act, 1936, which provided for compensation to be paid to mid-wives who surrendered their certificates within three years of the date of that Act. This Regulation only refers to those who voluntarily surrendered their certificates, and not to those who, in another Section, were required to surrender them.

Dr. Hill: Oddly enough, the reading of the Section which is the important thing, refers to voluntary relinquishment, but a side-note to the Section refers to
Compensation to midwives ceasing or required to cease practice.

9.0 p.m.

Mr. Blenkinsop: The Regulation refers to subsection (1) in the operative Act which does deal purely with those who voluntarily surrender their certificates. The point is that no new midwives are being brought into practice under this Regulation, nor have there been any for a number of years. There is a steadily diminishing number of midwives to which this applies. In 1947 there were 76, in 1948 65, in 1949 61, and although I have not a detailed figure before me, I understand that this year there has been another drop. There are no new additions, and gradually year by year there are retirements.
It is still the fact that the local authorities concerned are anxious to retain the services of these individual midwives who, very far from having had no experience during the last 11 years, have been in constant practice and have done extremely valuable work, who came back into midwifery work when there was special pressure during and immediately after the war and who are still urgently needed in those particular areas. I would assure the hon. Member that as the numbers are steadily diminishing each year, there is no doubt that before very long this will cease to have any effect at all. There would, therefore, be no particular point in including any special provision here for any amendment of the Midwives Act or anything of that kind. This is of a purely temporary character and will naturally cease as the midwives concerned retire from service.

Mr. Geoffrey Hutchinson: I am very glad to hear the Parliamentary Secretary say that this regulation is not intended to apply to those midwives who were required by the supervising authority to surrender their certificates. I hope the Parliamentary Secretary is correct in his interpretation of the Act of 1936. I am bound to say that my impression of Section 1 (1) of the Act which is referred to in the regulation was that it referred not only to midwives who voluntarily surrendered their certificates but also to those practising midwives who were required by the supervising authority to do so.

Mr. Blenkinsop: I referred to the Act to refresh my mind just before I entered the Chamber. There are succeeding subsections which refer to those who are required to surrender their certificates. There is no doubt about it.

Mr. Hutchinson: I am glad to hear the Parliamentary Secretary say that, because that explanation makes this regulation more acceptable than it otherwise would be. It is, however, a very unsatisfactory state of affairs that we should still by emergency powers regulations be making it possible for midwives who have surrendered their certificates more than 11 years ago to return to the practice of midwifery. I should have thought that the present situation with regard to the supply of midwives was such that it is still necessary for those engaged in the practice of midwifery to have retained their certificates. I should have thought it would have been better for an Amendment to be made to the Midwives Act and for this matter to be put upon quite a different footing from that on which it is left by the regulation.
The Parliamentary Secretary has said that the situation is likely to improve and that in course of time—he seemed to suggest it would be a very short time—the situation would correct itself and it would no longer be necessary for mid-wives to surrender their certificates under the Act. I hope that may be so, but I am bound to say that I think it would be much more satisfactory if we were either to decide now that nobody but a full qualified midwife who has been in practice as a midwife since 1936 should be allowed to continue service for a supervising authority, or else we should recognise that it is not possible to staff

these services with fully qualified mid-wives and make an amendment to the Public Health Act accordingly.

Amendment negatived.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 14, to leave out Regulation forty-two CA (Unlawful gaming parties)."
I must confess to certain personal affection for Defence Regulation 42CA, the one affected by this Amendment, because, as the Home Secretary, I notice, recalls, it was an order made under this Defence Regulation by him which was the subject matter of the only successful Prayer of the 1945 Parliament. The right hon. Gentleman will recall the circumstances. However, this regulation would seem to have very little connection indeed either with the defence of the realm against foreign enemies or with the setting up of the Socialist State, which are, I understand, the arguments used, with rather varying emphasis, to support the continuance of these regulations in general; and, indeed, the only connection I can see between those considerations and this regulation is that, under the level of taxation imposed in the Socialist State, it is only by gambling that it is possible to obtain an income without having it all taken away by taxation. Possibly that is the connection.
But it really does seem to me that one has only to look at subsection (1), with its definition of unlawful gaming parties, and at the procedural paragraphs later on, to deem it to be, whatever its merits, not the sort of subject matter which one would expect to be dealt with by Defence Regulations. It surely is the sort of subject which, if it is to be dealt with at all, should be dealt with by statute, as part of the regular law of the land, and I am fortified in that view and that expectation by certain words spoken by the then Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Ilkeston (Mr. Oliver), who, very nearly five years ago, when speaking from that Box, said:
A certain number of the regulations … have proved to be so useful that Parliament will probably be asked before long to agree to their being permanently placed on the Statute Book—for instance … Regulation' 42CA."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th November, 1945; Vol. 416, c. 242.]


Well, that was five years ago, and the expectation of the then Under-Secretary of State that this would be done "before long" does not appear to have been very fully justified.
None the less, it seems to have been a right expectation, and I hope we shall hear that it is the intention of the Government that this should be dealt with in the proper way. I do not know whether they are waiting for the result of the Royal Commission which is at the moment being presided over by a very distinguished former occupant of the Front Bench below me, Mr. Willink. It may be that that is the argument.
If that be the position, then I believe we shall not find it necessary to protract this particular discussion very long; but if, on the other hand, it is the Government's view that this matter should be dealt with over a long period simply by the procedure of Defence Regulation, I must say that that is a view from which most of us on these benches, I think, would most emphatically dissent. It is in the hope that we are to hear that the hope of the then Under-Secretary of State five years ago is a little nearer to being justified than it was then, that I beg to move.

Mr. Walker-Smith: I beg to second the Amendment.

Dr. Barnett Stross: I should like to take the opportunity to ask a question of the Home Secretary in reference to a matter I know that he will not remember; but some six months ago I wrote to him about a case that occurred in my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent, Central, where, on certain premises—I think the Liberal Club, actually—a group of people were accustomed to play whist, and had played it for very many years. They were told that they were transgressing the law, and the chief constable had to point out to them that there might be penalties as here prescribed. I think they would come under subsection (3, c)—
ten or more persons … present at any party at which any game of chance or of chance and skill combined was played or intended to be played.
The Home Secretary wrote and told me that in his view the chief constable was quite right to warn any people who played games of whist for a prize organised for them by any association if when playing

they were not constant to their opponents; that is to say, that they moved from seat to seat as the game went on.
He then hoped that the position would be clarified by legislation at some time within the reasonably near future, and I am taking this opportunity of pointing out to him something which I am sure he knows very well: that there must be hundreds of thousands of people who are interested in this matter, who know nothing whatsoever about roulette tables or any instrument that might be confiscated, as mentioned in the rest of this regulation. Could my right hon. Friend tell us when he thinks we shall get this matter regularised; and will it be in the reasonably near future?

Mr. Hutchinson: Will the Home Secretary tell us why a gaming party which is unlawful in England is apparently not unlawful in Scotland? Apparently this Regulation does not extend to Scotland. There may be some good reason for it, and I am sure we should all be grateful to the right hon. Gentleman if he would explain what the reason is.

Mr. Ede: On this occasion we have achieved home rule for England. That is the first answer. Secondly, I will ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland for his views on the matter. The warning to which my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Dr. Stross), alluded has nothing to do with this Defence Regulation at all. I see present a number of lawyers who practice the law in one form or another, who will know that for many years the question of the legality of whist drives has from time to time come before the courts, and has nothing whatever to do with this regulation.
I think the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) has pretty well diagnosed the situation with regard to this matter. I had hoped to introduce legislation to deal with this subject, but the appointment of the Royal Commission on Lotteries, Betting and Gaming made it appear desirable that we should wait until we had their recommendations before producing comprehensive legislation on the matter. The need for continuing this regulation for the next 12 months is increased by the possibility that there will be a considerable number of foreigners over here in connection with the Festival of Britain. I think it is well


known to the House that this regulation was originally passed so that we might protect troops visiting London and other big cities from the activities of certain people whom I am quite sure no hon. Member would desire to defend in the way they carry on this particular business.
It is desirable that I should point out that in the Metropolitan Police District in 1948, 52 warrants were executed, from which 47 successful prosecutions were obtained. For the current year, up to the present 15 warrants have been executed and 15 successful prosecutions have resulted. I think the numbers themselves indicate that the police have been reasonably successful in reducing this evil in London, and I hope the House will consider it desirable that they should still be armed with these powers.
9.15 p.m.
As the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames has said, when the order was produced I owned up at the time to the House that it was worded rather more strongly than, on reflection, I thought that the needs of the case required. On that, I accepted the hon. Member's Prayer. He was the only person to pray successfully during that Session. To that extent, he is entitled to take a paternal interest in this matter, and I am quite sure that he is not concerned with defending people at whom this order is aimed. I hope that the House will feel that there is a reasonable ground for continuing this Regulation temporarily, and that we may be given these powers for the next 12 months.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: I apologise to the hon. Gentleman who moved this Amendment for not having heard his speech or some of the subsequent Debate. It seems to me that this regulation is one of the worst examples of delegated legislation that there has been. I am not concerned with defending people who pursue nefarious practices in gaming houses, but this regulation gives the police an enormous power of arrest without warrant on extremely flimsy grounds, which could be—I do not say that it has, because I do not know—very mischievous indeed in its operation.
It seems to me that if it is thought desirable—and I have never been satisfied of the need for it—to give to the police the power of arrest without warrant in certain circumstances of this kind, which

they would not have in cases of serious felony, it is not one of the things that ought to be done in this way. I am a little surprised that those who have been so very enthusiastic earlier this afternoon about the general principle and its possible abuse, when they have in front of them a particular example of what I think is certainly an extreme use of power by delegated legislation, not to be justified by the general considerations that governed our general Debate this afternoon, should miss an opportunity of making representations about it.
I do not think the House realises what powers a police inspector would have under this Regulation. Prima facie any 10 people playing cards are guilty of an offence against the Regulation. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I think so. Subsection (c) states:
Evidence that 10 or more persons were present at any party at which any game of chance or of chance and skill combined was played or intended to be played, shall be evidence that the party was an unlawful gaming party unless"—

Hon. Members: Read on.

Mr. Silverman: I will read on but I prefer to stop there for a moment. I shall not evade the other point. It is quite true that it goes on to allow the defendant to prove that it was not a gaming party, but by doing it in that way a serious alteration of our criminal law is made. The mere fact that 10 persons in one room are assembled for the purpose of playing bridge constitutes an offence, unless they discharge the onus upon them of proving what the section allows to be proved as a defence. It may be right to do that, but I am sure it is not right to alter a principle of our criminal law by delegated legislation in that way.
When we go on to read the Clause, we find that if an inspector of police has reasonable cause to think that an offence is being committed, he may enter the premises and arrest anyone he finds there without applying for a warrant. It is going a long way indeed to give an inspector of police the power to enter premises and arrest anybody he finds there, leaving it to them to prove their innocence before the magistrate the next morning. I do not think powers ought to be used to make serious alterations to the criminal law in minor offences.
I appreciate that the Home Secretary says it is proposed to bring forward legislation on the gaming laws as soon as it is practicable to do so. Therefore, it is not a matter of very great principle if the present power has been in existence for some years and it is extended for another 12 months. In these circumstances, I would not ask the House to divide, although it is in this field, rather than in the field of industry and commerce, that we should have regard to the use the Government make of the powers given to them by Parliament.

Mr. Walker-Smith: It is very gratifying to find the hon. Member so outraged at the practice of putting the onus on an individual to prove his innocence. Will he remind the House of what his attitude was in the recent case of red petrol, when the onus was put on the individual to disprove his guilt?

Mr. Silverman: It is a perfectly fair question. I thought that that was justifiable. The presence of red petrol in the tank of a vehicle raised a presumption of guilt, and it was quite reasonable to call upon the owner or the driver to prove his innocence. But I do not think the mere playing of cards raises such a reasonable inference of guilt.

Mr. Ede: May I, by leave of the House, point out that the hon. Member made the same point when this matter was previously before the House? I had hoped that by now this would have been given legislative form. My hon. Friend is generally so correct on matters of detail that I am sure he will not mind if I point out that the officer has to be not below the rank of superintendent to give the certificate on which entry is made.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Despite the attempt of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) to provoke me, I do not think, in view of what the Home Secretary has said, that it would be right to press this Amendment. It ill-becomes the hon. Member, who took no steps to raise this question, to rebuke us, who took the trouble to put an Amendment on the Order Paper, for lack of interest in the subject.

Mr. Speaker: I would point out that the hon. Member has no right to speak again.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I apologise, Mr. Speaker, for having been led away by the provocation which came from the hon. Member opposite. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 18, to leave out "Regulation fifty-five C (Restrictions on Registration of new clubs)."
The history of this regulation since the war has been rather similar to that of the regulation that we have recently been discussing, for on 20th November, 1945, this House was told by the then Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Ilkeston (Mr. Oliver), that the reason for the carrying forward of this regulation into peacetime was that bogus clubs were likely to be promoted during the re-settlement period in an attempt to prey on the demobilised members of the Forces. That may have been one reason, but not the whole reason. Another former Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department told us in November, 1947—that is, three years ago—that the Government thought that permanent provision should be made instead of these Defence Regulations.
This is quite a simple regulation. I should have thought it would have been comparatively simple to take this regulation out and replace it by a Bill, althought I dare say it might have provoked a certain amount of comment from the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. J. Hudson). Knowing that he has strong views on this subject, I should like to assure him that we have put down this Amendment not to secure the immediate repeal of this regulation but with a view to ascertaining what are the Government's intentions with regard to it. Three years ago they stated that permanent provision should be made, but none has been made as yet. What is the position? I do not think there is any Royal Commission on clubs sitting at the moment. There was a Royal Commission on gaming, but it would be interesting to know—I think this House is entitled to know in view of what has been said—what are the Government's views with regard to replacing this regulation by permanent legislation.

Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: I beg to second the Amendment.

Mr. James Hudson: The hon. and learned Member for Northants, South (Mr. Manningham-Buller) thinks he has drawn me into this Debate, but I want to assure him that I speak irrespective of his own contribution because I feel that the Opposition have no case at all, either in the modified suggestion now being made by the hon. and learned Gentleman, or in the terms of the Amendment. The hon. and learned Gentleman wants to know what the Government are going to do about clubs generally. It is rather late in the day for the Opposition to worry themselves about that, because we have been dealing with the matter and, despite what the hon. and learned Gentleman says, a Royal Commission has dealt very explicitly with the subject, and has recommended what should be done about clubs, particularly bad clubs.
9.30 p.m.
The regulation that we are discussing, I agree, does not cover the whole club question, and I am not attempting now to bring in the whole question of clubs and the supply of liquor in them. It is true that for many years it has been well known that there are certain types of clubs so disorderly in character that Parliament has been confronted with the necessity to pass legislation dealing with the issue. We have failed to do so in the House of Commons. I am sorry to see that the hon. and learned Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Hopkin Morris) is not present, because on the first occasion I came into this House in 1924, a quarter of a century ago, he introduced a Clubs Bill. This was discussed and received the support of a considerable number of the Members of the Labour Government of that day, but nothing came of it. I was much impressed with the terms of the Bill, and later I introduced one and submitted it to the Royal Commission in evidence and had it accepted as a necessity. In fact, I was one of the few witnesses whose evidence was accepted in toto with regard to the club evil.
But still this went on. Hon. Members opposite had no more to say on the matter except in the days when they had Sir John Simon as their Home Secretary in a National Government. He admitted that something would have to be done, but nothing was done until in another place members of the party opposite produced

evidence of the scandalous character of the drinking clubs in certain parts of London. So, at last, something had to be attempted. Even then, after it had been proved that there were clubs with spyholes, electric warning bells and barbed wire, that there were clubs with criminals and prostitutes run for the purposes of criminals and prostitutes—this all on the evidence of members of the party opposite—still, despite the interest which hon. Gentlemen now have in the matter, nothing was done.
It was left to my right hon. Friend, during the time he was Home Secretary, to give body to the propositions in this regulation. A regulation was introduced which has had extremely beneficent consequences. Clubs of the character I have referred to can now be dealt with by the police, in view of the failure of this House to deal with them; or, at any rate, attempts can be made by the police in the form of insisting that the law shall be kept where a magistrate has had a complaint made to him. In my judgment that has had a completely good result.

Mr. Speaker: I understand this regulation deals with restrictions on registration of new clubs, and not with what has been happening in clubs already in existence and how the law applies to them.

Mr. Hudson: Then I will confine myself, Sir, to the new clubs. Having described what the old clubs were like, and how disgraceful offences were committed in them, I am profoundly thankful that the Home Secretary has been successful in limiting the places I have dealt with. I hope that we shall stand firmly by this regulation. Indeed, I would like to have said to the hon. and learned Member for Carmarthen that this is a good example of the capacity to deal with an evil through delegated legislation where is has not been possible to produce more general legislation that we needed.

Sir Herbert Williams: The hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. J. Hudson) is not a very good advertisement for his own cause, for, although he is sober, he could not read what is in the regulation we are discussing and Mr. Speaker called him to order.

Mr. Follick: But my hon. Friend got in a good one.

Sir H. Williams: All the things the hon. Member for Ealing, North, was talking about could be dealt with if this Defence Regulation were wiped out. What we are talking about is whether the regulation should continue, and I see no reason why it should be continued. If a club is ill-conducted, it is struck-off. If a reputable body of people want to register a club, why should they not be allowed to do so under the law which has been in use for many years? Although hon. Members talk about it, none is desirous that the law should be altered. In general, I do not see why a body of decent citizens, members of the Labour Party, perhaps— and there are lots of Labour clubs up and down the country—if inspired by Socialist motives, should be able to get together and, in accordance with the law, drink as much as the law will allow them.

Mr. Remnant: I hope the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. J. Hudson) was not speaking from firsthand experience, or necessity would be the mother of another Defence Regulation. I preferred the argument of the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow), who seemed to regard the Defence Regulations as a period of test and trial. I submit that there can be no dissension from the view, which I support in this Amendment, that the time has come when the provisions of this regulation should be made permanent by legislation. There can be none of us, not even the hon. Member for Ealing, North, who would wish to do away with the three provisions for the restrictions on new clubs, namely, the proof of genuine need, the necessity for inaccurate information to be corrected and the question of the bona fides of the promoters and officials.
Although the whole question of clubs is a very thorny one, I submit to the Home Secretary that the time is rapidly arriving when he will have to grasp that nettle extremely firmly. I have no doubt he will agree with me that if he decided to do so, he would receive plenty of advice intended to be helpful from a great many directions, even on such thorny problems of why it is that clubs can provide music and dancing on Sundays while "pubs" cannot. I support the Amendment on the ground that the provisions have been fully tried and proved and should be made permanent.

Mr. Ede: Here, again, I regret that it has not been possible to produce permanent legislation on this matter. I regret also that I was not able to deal with it in the Licensing Act I promoted, because it would have so widened the scope of the Measure before Parliament that, as I am quite sure the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) will agree, it might have made it impossible to get that Measure through at that time.
This regulation is aimed at one of the defects of the law relating to clubs. When there is a successful prosecution of a club and its officers for breaches of the law, the building in which the club is conducted is placed under an inhibition by which those premises cannot be used as a club for another 12 months; but, no matter how guilty the parties may have been, how flagrant their defiance of the law may have been and how little they conform to the description of the hon. Member for Croydon, East (Sir H. Williams), of the people who want to form clubs, they can get together the next day, put 5s. down and a book of rules and start a new club very near to the premises that have just been placed under the inhibition. I am sure that that is a breach of the general intention of the law which no one would think desirable.
What happens under this provision is that the police can object, but their objection is not final. If the promoters of the club think, for one reason or another, that this action on the part of the police is harsh, they can appeal. May I give the House the history of what has transpired since the end of the war under this provision in the Metropolitan Police district? In 1945 there were 28 police objections and five appeals, none of which was successful. In 1946 there were 36 objections and eight appeals, two of which were successful. In 1947 there were 20 objections and five appeals, none of which was successful. In 1948 there were 13 objections and six appeals, none of which was successful. In 1949 there were six objections and one appeal, which was successful.
The drop in the number of police objections shows that the police are administering the regulation with reasonable consideration for the needs of the community, and the fact that so few appeals—only three during that period—have been successful reinforces that point.


I would hope that it may be possible to introduce legislation that will enable the House to consider the whole of this very difficult question of the registration of new clubs. I do not think it is a provision that ought too long to be continued merely in a regulation, but I am quite certain that if no power exists, either by Statute or by regulation, there might be a crop of the undesirable kind of clubs that I have indicated—really the successors of clubs already declared illegal—which would make the work of the police and other social workers very difficult.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: With the leave of the House, I should like, before asking the leave of the House to withdraw the Amendment, to make it quite clear that we were not seeking to have the regulation made ineffective or cancelled. We put down this Amendment with a view to finding out what were the prospects of having it replaced by a Statute. I entirely agree with the final remarks of the right hon. Gentleman on that subject. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 27, to leave out "Regulation eight-five (Entry upon and inspection of land)."
It seems to me that this Amendment raises a somewhat larger general issue than any which has been raised on the previous detailed Amendments which the House has been discussing. I say that not withstanding that if one looks at the bound volume of the Defence Regulations this one has the innocent heading "Administrative Provisions." If one looks at the regulation, however, it will be seen that it confers very big powers indeed. Perhaps I might read the first few lines. It states:
Any person authorised by a competent authority may, on producing, if so required, some duly authenticated document showing his authority,—

(a) enter on any land for the purpose of exercising any of the powers conferred by or under any of these Regulations;
(b) enter on any land and inspect the land and any article thereon for the purpose of determining whether, and, if so, in what manner, any of those powers are to be exercised in relation to the land or that article;"

and (c), which I understand relates more to defence matters, and therefore is perhaps

a little less objectionable. But the regulation as a whole, as I understand it, goes a long way beyond facilitating defence arrangements. It confers a general power of entry upon land for any of the purposes dealt with by any of the Defence Regulations, and as such it is extremely wide; and does seem to raise some considerable issues of principle.
9.45 p.m.
I suppose we must abandon the idea of the sanctity at any rate of a man's private house from the entry of officials of the Government. That seems to be disregarded in circles now predominating in this country though it is very dear to a great many people in this country still. All the same, to go to the other extreme and to concede to Government Departments this general power of entry is a matter that at least calls for detailed justification. I hope that in a discussion on this Amendment some serious attempt may be made from the bench opposite to justify the taking of the very wide powers in general.
So far as sub-paragraph (c) is concerned, which links up with regulations having a definite bearing on defence, I do not stress the matter very far. Obviously, we have to give Defence Departments considerable rights of entry upon private property in order that they shall effectively carry out their duties. I do not think that in the present circumstances—although it may have been so in easier international circumstances—that there can be any great dispute about that. But when it comes to authorising Departments having nothing whatever to do with defence to enter it is a matter which calls for detailed justification.
There is a subsidiary issue of some practical importance which arises in the words I read to the House. A person who is authorised by competent authorities who desires to exercise those rights of entry has to produce:
some duly authenticated documents showing his authority.
No doubt that is done. But surely it is equally true that in a great majority of cases the citizen upon whose property entry is so sought to be effected is not aware of what a duly authenticated document is or looks like. It is no use saying that it will be in the prescribed form, or that it will be in the usual form of a somewhat dirty bit of cardboard with a crown


at one end and an illegible signature at the other, because the ordinary citizen does not know what it looks like.
There would be no difficulty whatever for any imposter to produce some such document as I have described and to put it forward as the necessary document. The ordinary citizen, and I am not sure that even the Attorney-General himself, might have some difficulty in knowing on the spot whether it was a genuine document, genuinely giving such power, or whether it was a forgery. There seem to be objections on practical grounds that this power of entry should be exercised on so unreliable and irregular a basis. If it is desired to retain this power of entry, some more effective means should be devised of advising the citizen whether it is a genuine exercise of right of entry which, if the citizen obstructs, he is, under another regulation, subject to criminal penalties, or whether it is an ingenious attempt by a criminal to obtain entry without difficulty.
There is a practical problem, and it would make it very much easier both for officers of the Government exercising their legitimate functions and for the police in detecting crime if some clear, unambiguous method of establishing the right of entry could be provided. That is a subsidiary issue. The main issue of principle is the giving, at any rate to the civil Departments, of this right of entry at all in time of peace. Before this House can agree to that, it must surely be justified by a Minister of the Crown and shown to be really and seriously necessary.

Mr. John Hay: I beg to second the Amendment.
I have always regarded this regulation as one of the most obnoxious that we have in this country. I should like to refer to the question of what is a competent authority under this regulation. Paragraph (2) explains who is a competent authority by referring us indirectly to Regulation 49. No doubt the House will be interested to know that a competent authority for the purpose of entering upon land as envisaged by this regulation is either a Secretary of State, the Admiralty, the Board of Trade, the Board of Education, the Minister of Fuel and Power, the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Minister of Health, the Minister of Transport, the Minister of

Production, the Minister of Supply, the Minister of Food, the Minister of Aircraft Production, the Postmaster-General or the Minister of Works.
All those various Departments of State have power under this regulation to enter upon private property. Not only that. I would draw the attention of the House to paragraph (2) which provides that:
A competent authority.…
any of those mentioned in the other regulation—
may, to such an extent and subject to such restrictions as it thinks proper, delegate its functions under paragraph (1) of this Regulation to any specified persons or class of persons.
Ever since this regulation came into force a large number of inspectors and various other persons have been authorised to intrude upon private property. It is about time this regulation came to an end. I should be glad to hear exactly what is the justification for it at present.
A good deal of point has been made in this Debate to the effect that these regulations are needed for economic planning or for national security. I cannot see how it is necessary, either in the interests of economic planning or of national security, for the average individual, the ordinary householder, to have his home and property invaded albeit by notice. It used to be said that an Englishman's home was his castle. I have noticed that that can no longer be said. I hope that this regulation will go.

Mr. Grimond: The party to which I belong took exception earlier today to the general trend of legislation which trenches both on the rights of the individual and on the rights of Parliament. My party would be open to criticism if we did not now lend our support to the Amendment. It seems that this regulation gives the widest power to officials of a variety of Ministries to enter upon land and property. It even appears to allow them to do so without the actual knowledge of the man to whom the property belongs. If the intruder happens to be challenged by the owner, as the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) pointed out, he can probably escape any close check on his credentials by producing a bit of paper or referring to a regulation which few people will know about or be able to examine.
So far as these regulations are necessary for the purpose of defence, of course we must accept them; but it seems now that, having barred the front door of the Englishman's castle, we are gradually forcing open the back door, and that many officials can now penetrate into a man's property without any real check on the need for their invasion. I daresay that the argument will be put that this power will seldom be used. In a case of this sort where we are concerned with the rights of the individual, even if the power is used only once or twice, it is surely the business of Parliament to protect the individiual against entrenchments of this sort on his ancient and fundamental rights.

The Attorney-General: I cannot help thinking that there is some misunderstanding on the part of hon. Members opposite in regard to the scope and purpose of this regulation. We on this side are at least as jealous as the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Hay) and his friends of the ancient and most important doctrine that an Englishman's home is his castle, and I would have conceded at once, if it had been put to me from the other side, that there are some Statutes, by no means all of them of recent origin, in which there are powers of entry, the necessity or desirability for which may still be argued.
I certainly did not think it would be said that the very limited power of entry in Regulation 85 would come quite within that category. If hon. Members opposite will look at this regulation and the other regulations in this volume, I think they will agree that they really have put forward in this Amendment a classic case of swallowing the camel and straining at the gnat. The hon. Member for Henley pointed out that power of entry could only be used by one or other of the persons in the list of eminently respectable authorities set out in Defence Regulation 49, but it cannot even be used by even these resepectable authorties except for one of the limited purposes contained in Part IV of the General Regulations.
The necessity for these regulations has not, I think, been seriously put in doubt in the whole course of our discussions in the House today. It is not in doubt, for instance, that Defence Regulation 50, enabling competent authorities to do work on land, is still necessary. The military

authorities must be entitled in existing circumstances, for instance, to carry a petrol pipeline over land to an aerodrome, but it is said that, while that is necessary, they must have no power under Defence Regulation 85 to enter upon the land in order to do work upon it.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I do not think the right hon. and learned Gentleman is being quite fair. He will recall that I conceded the case of the Defence Departments for defence works, which is the example he is now quoting.

The Attorney-General: What the hon. Gentleman conceded was the power under paragraph (c) of this Regulation. I am not dealing with paragraph (c), but with the earlier paragraphs of Regulation 85. Paragraph (c) is one under which, particularly in connection with aerodromes, something in the nature of a right of way is established on a more or less permanent basis. I am dealing now with the case where entry has to be made on land for the limited purpose of doing certain work upon it, and, after that work is done, entry is no longer necessary, except for repair or maintenance or something of that kind.
Then, it is conceded—and I have not heard it seriously contested this afternoon—that Defence Regulation 50A, in regard to taking water from land, is justifiable in existing circumstances. One can think of such a military necessity at the present time. "You may take water from land," say hon. Members opposite, "under Regulation 50A, but you must not enter on the land under Regulation 85 (c) in order to do it." Then, it is not in doubt—really, these are serious arguments, and this is the purpose and the only purpose of these Regulations—it is not in doubt that the power to requisition land and chattels must be retained for the present, but it is said that, although these powers are necessary, people must not be entitled under Regulation 85 to go on the land to inspect it and see whether it is the kind of land or chattel that it is desirable to requisition.
These are the classes of case for which this particular Regulation is used. It is correctly described in the Defence Regulations as administrative. Perhaps a better word would have been ancillary or incidental. It is a power which is incidental to the main powers under Part IV, the requisitioning powers, the


powers of doing work upon land and the powers of dealing with essential supplies. Unless there was the power of entry upon the land, it would be quite impossible in practice to operate the substantive regulation to which Regulation 85 is incidental.
10.0 p.m.
I quite agree with the hon. Member for Henley that one could find a great many powers of entry under different statutes and regulations about which legitimate argument would be possible, but I ask the House to believe that this power under this regulation is really essential to the working of Part IV of the General Regulations themselves, that it is incidental to that, and that it is indeed a diminishing power and not one of which I, at any rate, have heard any complaint at all.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: While recognising that for certain purposes it is necessary as long as we have Defence Regulations to have a power of entry upon land, I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman has not really dealt with the whole field which this regulation covers. Land includes buildings, as he will agree. Indeed, the definition Regulation shows that land includes buildings and houses. Therefore, in considering this Defence Regulation we are considering a power of entry into something much more than just agricultural land for the purpose of laying a drain pipe or something of that character. We are here considering the right given to any person authorised by a competent authority really to enter any house in the country. I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman will agree that the power under the regulation as drawn does go as far as that.

The Attorney-General: If the hon. and learned Gentleman is asking me that, I certainly agree. Subject to giving certain notice, the power goes as far as that, provided the house or building is one which can be requisitioned or on which work may be done under the substantive regulations, and that the power of entry is required in that connection and that connection only.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: I think that paragraph (a) of this regulation is pretty general. It says:

enter on any land for the purpose of exercising any of the powers conferred by or under any of these Regulations.
It could hardly be more general. If it was a case of unlawful gaming under Regulation 42c in a club in, for instance, the Home Secretary's constituency, I imagine that any person authorised by a competent authority would, under this paragraph, be able to enter any house to find out whether 10 or more people were playing bridge or whist, or whatever games they play in those parts, and that this regulation would cover it; but I would ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman to look at it again, because the definition of land is wide enough to include all houses. The wording of the regulation would seem to cover the exercise of any power under any of the regulations, and so would, I should have thought, cover the case of unlawful gaming, or, indeed, of a supposed registration of a new club. I think we ought to hear clearly from the right hon. and learned Gentleman that it has that wide application before we pass from this regulation.

The Attorney-General: By leave of the House, may I just say that I will certainly look at that, although I do not think it has the wide application which the hon. and learned Gentleman suggests. For instance, if one looks at the last regulation which we were discussing about the unlawful gaming parties, the hon. and learned Gentleman will see that the express power of search is provided there. What Regulation 85 deals with is the case where there is already a power under one or other of the regulations, and they are mainly in practice in Part IV. That power can only be exercised by entering upon land. That is what paragraph (a) of Regulation 85 says—
for the purpose of exercising any of the powers conferred by or under any of the Regulations
there may be entry upon land. It is no good having the powers under the substantive regulation unless one can enter land, or it may be a building in some cases, to enforce it. This really is an incidental power. I will certainly look at it again, but I give the hon. and learned Member for Northants, South, the assurance that this is not commonly used, and it is not a power of which one sometimes hears complaints.

Mr. Walker-Smith: I should like to comment briefly on what the Attorney-General says. I was rather surprised to hear him whittle away the effect of this regulation. In the first place, he said it could only be exercised by comparatively few people.

The Attorney-General: Comparatively respectable people.

Mr. Walker-Smith: There is a list of these comparatively respectable people in Regulation 49, starting of with a Secretary of State, the Minister of Fuel and Power, and so on. I am bound to say, with all respect, that, so far as the present Government goes, infinitely the two most respectable appear to be the Minister of Production and the Minister of Aircraft Production, who are specified in that regulation.
Be they respectable or not, there is a very large number of these competent authorities, and by a duly authenticated document they can give anybody, without restriction, the power to exercise the right of entry. So it is a very wide power in that sense. The House has spent most of the afternoon in stressing how very wide are the powers given by regulation under Part IV. The Attorney-General says that the House is agreed that these regulations were required.
What was stressed from this side of the House is that, in so far as any of these regulations are required, they should be in a permanent statutory form, and if that were done, then surely this right of search could be put in permanent statutory form with safeguards that would be appropriate for its permament form. The right hon. and learned Gentleman mentioned requisitioning. That is a case in point; if it is to be permanent or semi-permanent, it should have a code or procedure to cover it and that code should include necessary safeguards for the right of entry under Regulation 85.

Sir H. Williams: I think this goes very much further than the Attorney-General indicated. It is not limited to competent authorities. Paragraph (2) refers to "Specified persons or class of persons." The whole of the staff of a Department could be a class of persons. They could all have the power of entry.
This right of entry can be used for any purpose anybody desires. A person who enters the premises may say, "I want

to enter the premises because I want to requisition them," but that may not be his purpose at all. It may be a purpose under Regulation 88A, where a justice has to be satisfied before it can be done. If the Ministry of Food suspect that an offence has been committed in a grocer's office, they can send one of their minions along with a view to requisitioning. He can use that entry to find whether an offence has been committed under one of the innumerable regulations of the Ministry of Food. So it can be abused if there are bad people about.
Regulation 88 says that no female may be searched except by another female. Regulation 88A says that no woman may be searched except by a woman. When the Attorney-General has time to spare, perhaps he will tell us what is the difference between a female and a woman.

The Attorney-General: We will talk about that later.

Amendment negatived.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 29, to leave out:
Regulation eighty-eight (Fees for permits, licences, etc.).
This regulation is described as an administrative provision. It is the provision under which a fee of up to £5 can be charged for any permit, licence, certificate or other document for the purposes of these regulations. There are two points, one of principle and one of practice, that it seems worth while to consider.
First of all, on the point of principle, if a licensing system and an elaborate system of controls is to be maintained, it must be assumed in favour of His Majesty's Government that licences, permits and so on are only granted when it is in the public interest that they should be granted. That is the only possible justification for having such a system at all. If, therefore, in the interests of the public a licence is granted, there having been compulsion to apply for it, it seems wrong in principle that the successful applicant should have to pay a fee. The amount admittedly is not likely to be large. It cannot be more than £5 under the regulation, but it seems doubtful in principle whether the State should be allowed to use as an instrument of taxation a system of controls which purports to be set up for another purpose.
Secondly, on the practical aspect, I do not know whether hon. Members realise how many licences, permits and so on are issued nowadays. I would commend to hon. Members who are interested the figures which are given in Appendix II of the Report of the Herbert Committee on Intermediaries, where the really startling size of this affair is set out in very considerable detail, Department by Department. For example, with respect to the Board of Trade one finds there are 300,000 applications for import licences and 728,000 for export licences. When one looks under the same Department for applications for licences for raw materials, the figure is 850,000.
The number of these documents which permit people to do things which in the normal way they would do without asking anybody's permission is very large, and that adds a certain significance to the question of the desirability or otherwise of charging a fee when they are permitted to do so. It is a form of disguised taxation, and it is a form of taxation upon those people whom it must be assumed have been given those licences because it is in the public interest that they should have them.
The matter seems worthy of a little elucidation. If we could be told the amount of revenue which the Departments raise in this way, it would be of some relevance to the size of the problem, and I should also like to hear from whoever is to reply some comment on the small, but I think not unimportant, issue of principle which arises.

Mr. Hay: I beg to second the Amendment.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Douglas Jay): As has been said by the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter), this is a small administrative provision, and I think there is just the same case for it today as there was when it was introduced at the beginning of the war.
The real purpose of this power was to create some deterrent against the careless use of permits, licences and so forth which would give rise to requests for renewal. It was, in fact, a measure—no doubt a modest one—of public economy. It does, of course, involve some expenditure of manpower and materials to

produce the unfortunately large number of permits and licences which the hon. Member mentioned. It has in fact been used in practice almost entirely in the case of food ration cards lost by the users and, therefore, needing to be renewed. Hon. Members will realise that the food ration card is not entirely simply what one hon. Member described today as "a small and dirty piece of cardboard," but is a quite complicated document; and we all know from experience that there is a certain cost involved in its production.
10.15 p.m.
It has been found, therefore, to be desirable that there should be a certain deterrent to frivolous or careless loss of ration cards. The Ministry of Food in practice cannot refuse to issue a new ration card to somebody who has lost the old one, because without the coupons, after all, the citizen cannot obtain essential foods. Therefore, for that quite simple reason, it has been found desirable in practice to charge a fee, I think of one shilling, in certain cases for the renewal of ration cards.
That was found to be desirable when food rationing was first introduced. If it was so, then I do not think there is any reason to believe it is not so now. I think we might have argued at the beginning whether it was desirable to have this-power for this purpose or not; but surely, if it was found useful or necessary at the beginning, there is, so far as I can see, no reason for abandoning it so long as the permits, licences and ration cards, to which it gives rise, are still in force. I think as long as the licences and permits and so on, are still in force, which arise from the various regulations which the House has accepted today, are still in force there is exactly the same case for this small safeguard for public economy which there was when they were first instituted.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, if what he says has force—and I think it has with reference to food ration cards—why is power preserved in the regulation to charge a fee for every form of licence?

Mr. Jay: I gave food ration cards as an example because I understood it is in that case that the power has been mainly used,


but, of course, it is not the sole case on which the question of deterrent against careless or frivolous uses arises. It is only the principal case.

Mr. Hutchinson: Will the hon. Gentleman tell the House whether any fee is payable on an import or an export licence?

Mr. Jay: It could in fact be charged, of course, under this provision if it were found necessary, but, so far as I know, it is not normally done.

Captain Duncan: Will the hon. Gentleman take a look at this in the hope that next year this nutcracker can be abolished? It seems to me to be quite unnecessary for the simple case—the sole case—of the lost ration card to have a Defence Regulation of this kind. If that is the only case, surely the small loss of revenue would be so small as to make it not worth while continuing the elaborate process which has to be gone through with the extra paper and business required in charging extra fees. It seems to me a piece of completely unnecessary Government interference, and I hope that, if it cannot be abolished tonight, it will be next year.

Amendment negatived.

Mr. Manningham-Buller: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Motion, in line 30, to leave out "Regulation eighty-nine (Use of force in entering premises.)"
Regulation 89, for the benefit of those who have not got the latest edition of these regulations, published in 1948, reads as follows:
Where, by virtue of any of these Regulations, a person has any power to enter premises, he may use such force as is reasonably necessary for the purpose of exercising that power.
I am sorry that the Attorney-General is absent at this moment, because I think it would have been useful to the House to have heard his views upon this regulation. I ask hon. Members to bear in mind that this power of using force to effect entry is not limited to entry effected under Regulation 85, which we have just been discussing, but includes entry under any of these regulations. I also ask the House to bear in mind that the entry to which we are referring is not just entry into a field, but may be entry into any kind of dwelling-house, large or small, by night or by day.
One finds that under this regulation power can be given whereby if any hon. Members opposite on going away for their long holiday leave their houses locked up, on 24 hours notice there can be a breaking into their homes, using as much force as may be necessary, and the Home Secretary could not do anything about it, nor could the police do anything about it because it would be lawful under this regulation. In these days, although in certain circumstances the power of entry is no doubt justified, it seems to me to require some explanation if the Government want to retain this power of using force to effect entry when under the regulation entry can be effected into a private dwelling-house on so short a notice as 24 hours.
I can imagine what would be said if people come back from their holiday, find their house broken open and report it to the police, only to be told, "Oh, that was all right. That was a forcible entry effected by some representative of some Ministry for the purpose of ascertaining whether that Ministry wanted to take over and requisition your home." That could be done under this regulation. I am giving that illustration to indicate the scope of the regulation. We ought to be extremely careful about the powers we give of effecting forcible entry. I would even suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that the power of forcible entry should at this time be restricted to the hours of daylight. It seems very wrong that a person could find someone breaking into his house in the middle of the night and think he was a burglar, only to find, that: he was someone authorised to break ire because 24 hours notice had been given. I do not know whether the Home Secretary will seek to justify the retention of this Defence Regulation, but I hope I have made my doubts about it clear.

Sir H. Williams: I beg to second the Amendment.
I wish to carry the point made by my hon. and learned Friend a little further. Under Regulation 88A no notice is required to be given if one of the competent or incompetent persons appointed by the competent authority can get a magistrate to issue a warrant. That apparently can be used at any time of the day or night, and force can be used to enter. Suppose somebody using a jimmy—I think that is what they are called in professional circles


—[HON. MEMBERS: "Jemmy."] Hon. Members opposite are better acquainted with these things than I am. Suppose a person were using one of these instruments for the purpose of entering premises which they have authority to enter and a man passing by, thinking he is being a good citizen, takes steps to restrain the person from entering the premises by force.
What is the position of the honest citizen trying to prevent what he regards in day-time as housebreaking and at nighttime as burglary? The only time during which there was a forcible entry into the flat in which I live, there was no one on the premises. Those who made the entry found £100 worth of stuff belonging to my daughter, and the police never refound it. That was in daylight. When I see someone breaking in to premises what shall I do? Many of us might be landed in great difficulties if someone was making improper use of these powers. A large number of premises in London are unoccupied for a substantial period of the day, and we may have grave results arising unless there are greater safeguards contained in the Regulations than there are at present.

Mr. Hutchinson: The surprising thing about this regulation is the terms in which it is drawn. A person authorised to enter the premises may use such force as is reasonably necessary for the purpose of exercising that power. The regulation does not require that he shall take any previous step before he exercises that power. He is not required to allow some period of time to elapse or to serve any notice on anyone. It may be that he cannot find anyone on whom to serve notice. He is not even required to post a notice on the premises which he desires to enter for a prescribed time before the power of forcible entry arises.
The Home Secretary is no doubt aware of the powers of forcible entry in other cases. The person to whom power of forcible entry is given is required to take some preliminary steps to satisfy someone that he is not able to get in by the normal means. He is required to serve a notice, or even to post a notice on the premises, and to allow it to remain there for a prescribed time. Under this regulation, there is nothing of that kind at all. As soon as the power to enter a premises arises the person who is authorised to

enter is authorised by this regulation to use force to effect his entry. I submit to the House that that is wrong.
If some power of forcible entry is considered necessary, it ought not to be a wide power of this character. It ought to be restricted in some well-known way by which the power of forcible entry is normally restricted. I hope that the Home Secretary will tell us that if this regulation is to be continued in the future it will be continued in different terms from those in which it comes before us today.

10.30 p.m.

Mr. Ede: We have heard some alarming descriptions of what might happen under this regulation. After all, it has been in existence for some 11 years, and I have never heard of any complaint that it has ever been used in a single case in the way that has been conjured up before our imaginations tonight. After all, having passed Regulation 85, it is essential that we should be able to insure that the powers given under that Regulation can be carried out. When we were discussing Regulation 85, the hon. and learned Member for Northants, South (Mr. Manning-ham-Buller), instanced the case of an unlawful gaming party. May I point out to him that if this regulation were restricted to daytime, it would be practically inoperative so far as an illegal gaming party was concerned, unless it had been conducted for so long a time that the sun had risen on the people who had assembled in the dark. In fact, for that purpose it would still be essential that the powers should exist throughout the night as well as the day.
All sorts of conceivable mischiefs have been conjured up with regard to this regulation. In practice, they have never arisen. I do not think they are likely to arise. It is the lawyers' habit of dealing with the conceivable rather than with the probable that gets us into the kind of argument we have heard against this regulation. I think the same applies to the arguments of the hon. and learned Member for Ilford, North (Mr. Hutchinson).
I rejoiced when I read this regulation and thought I had to defend it. Here was a form of words that was completely understandable. I was not going to be questioned about what paragraph 3 (a) in the light of paragraph 7 (b) could mean. This regulation does give a clear and quite concise power. During a long


experience in circumstances where the abuses that were suggested might conceivably have been justified during the stress of war, it was found that these abuses never in fact occurred. I suggest that, having passed Regulation 85, it would be simply foolish not to arm the person authorised under Regulation 85 with these powers given under Regulation 89. I am quite sure of this, that in any case where an abuse of the kind that has been suggested this evening occurred and complaint was made, the Department concerned would see that the officer who had been guilty of such an abuse would be suitably dealt with.

Amendment negatived.

Main Question again proposed.

Captain Crookshank: I should like to make one point before we agree to this Motion. In the comparatively short debate we have had on the Amendments, the Opposition have succeeded in making the point which they set out to make, namely, to bring home to the Government and to the House the need for looking through all this body of regulations, before the period when the matter has to come before the House again. We have made our point because more than one Minister has said he will look at it again. The Home Secretary was good enough to say that he would see whether this could be put into permanent legislation; the Attorney-General said he would look into the wording of one of the Regulations—and so on.
Of course, it would have been possible, and I know hon. Members opposite know it, to have raised a debate on every single one of the lines of all this Schedule. Naturally, we did not wish to trouble the House in detail like that, because we merely wanted to establish a certain principle. I hope, therefore, that it will not be held against us by the Government that we have not protested about some of the others. Just to illustrate what I mean, in the second group—in which we have not put down any Amendment—called "Other Defence Regulations," there are several that I would urge the Government to look at, particularly Regulations (1), (2), (3) and (6) of the Defence (Armed Forces) Regulations, 1939. That is a series of regulations which allows aliens to become members of the Armed Forces of the Crown, and not only so, but they can be enlisted without taking the oath of allegiance.

Mr. Ede: They are not covered by this Motion.

Captain Crookshank: Yes, they are. I do not want to discuss them, but I should like to make three points. All these could have been discussed, and that is why it is all the more incumbent on the Government to look at them in their own time. On the two regulations which allow an alien to be enlisted and to become an officer without taking the oath of allegiance, I would say that I know why it was done in war time, and though I do not think that it is necessary in peace time, if it is I do not see why it should not be incorporated in the Army Annual Act. The whole of the Defence (Women's Forces) Regulations refer to women employed in medical corps and nursing services, and states that they should be considered to be members of the Armed Forces of the Crown. There are also various provisions about them. The Army Act has to be passed every year, and I would ask the Minister to see whether, if these provisions are required, they should not forthwith be put into the Army Act, and if the next year they are not needed, they could be taken out.
The other point is a little different. One of these regulations is the Defence (Parliamentary Under-Secretaries) Regulations. That enabled the Ministers of the Crown Act, 1937, to be changed so that the number of Under-Secretaries could be varied from time to time. I do not think that anyone objects to that: certainly none of the present Under-Secretaries does. This was done under regulation, but the extraordinary thing is—and there must be some error here—that that Act has been recently amended. It was amended in 1947 to enable the Economic Secretary to the Treasury to be appointed. It is mysterious why, when there was this legislation, someone did not think that that was the obvious occasion to make permanent what had been done, and had been accepted as useful, by regulation.
I hope, therefore, that Ministers will see that there has been something in the criticisms we have been making. I hope, also, that they are grateful to us for not having prolonged the Debate to the extent we could have done had we been so minded. We thought this length of Debate would serve to reinforce the plea


I made earlier in the day that, irrespective of the general aspect of the regulatory system, all these things should be looked at before we are asked to deal with them again.

Captain Duncan: I should like to support what my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) has said in urging the Government to go through these regulations with a fine tooth comb before next year, not only for the reasons he gave, but also for the reason that I believe the Government could save an enormous amount of money in the administration of the regulations. Whatever extra money is spent from now onwards, and the prospect of extra taxation in next year's Budget, means that it is obligatory on the Government to take every possible action to reduce expenditure in other directions. If the regulations were gone through with a fine tooth comb, and as many as possible got rid of and others dealt with by proper Parliamentary procedure, there would be an economy which would be of benefit to the taxpayer.

Sir H. Williams: I was prevented from being present earlier, but I was not, unfortunately, a Member when the Act of 1947 was passed. [HON. MEMBERS: "Fortunately."] If I had been present it would have been a much better Act. It would have been a worse Act if I had failed to convince the Government that I was right. Therefore, that is a stupid intervention. If Members look at the Order Paper, they will see that roughly half the Defence Regulations, assuming that this document is up to date—it is two years and 10 months old—have been allowed to be discussed. We have not had the opportunity to discuss the other half, because some of them run under the 1945 Act and others under the 1947 Act.
It seems thoroughly unsatisfactory that we should have an opportunity of discussing and seeking to amend only half of these regulations. I ask the Home Secretary to look into the point, to see that in future all these regulations shall be open to discussion. If I had followed the 1947 Act, I might have known the reason for this, which seems to me to have no relation to commonsense. I make a sincere appeal that the matter shall be put on a tidy basis.

Mr. Ede: May I say, on behalf of the Government, that we do not begrudge the time that has been given to this Debate? I think that the Opposition have shown a very just sense of proportion in the way they have dealt with the matter. We realise that the hon. Member for Croydon, East (Sir H. Williams) could have carried out his threat of last Thursday and moved an Amendment to each of these regulations.

Sir H. Williams: It was a promise and not a threat.

Mr. Ede: He made it as a promise, but I realised that it was a threat.
I hope the House will agree that the Debate has been conducted from this side in the spirit of trying to demonstrate the need for close Parliamentary examination from time to time of this type of legislation. We are now engaged on a most careful survey of the whole of this field, so that we can determine what are the matters that ought to be embodied in permanent legislation and what are, like the one or two with which I have dealt, excrescences on this form of legislation, the need for which was demonstrated by certain wartime requirements. The need probably existed before, but war-time circumstances forced the matter into public notice.
I will also see that the various points made by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman about some of these Defence Regulations dealing with the Services and Parliamentary Under-Secretaries, and so on, are carefully investigated with a view to taking the necessary steps to get each of them embodied in some appropriate statute. There is nothing more annoying when one is trying to study a specific subject, than to find that something which may be comparatively trivial but in the light of that study assumes great importance, is hidden away in some statute that does not appear to be connected with the subject in question.
I was responsible for promoting the Act of 1947 when it came before the House, and comparing the Bills with which I have been associated with those with which the hon. Member for Croydon, East (Sir H. Williams) was associated when he was supporting a Government, I doubt whether his presence here would have made the Bill better when it became an Act judged by the


standard his own Government set with regard to their Measures.
I would like to thank all hon. Members of the House—

Sir H. Williams: Would the right hon. Gentleman mind answering my point?

Mr. Ede: I thought it had been covered—

Sir H. Williams: No. My point is that some of these regulations are open to discussion because they operate under the Act of 1947. Those that operate under the Act of 1945 cannot be discussed in the way we have discussed the others today.

Mr. Ede: I know the point and I had hoped that was covered in the general answer I have given to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough. I desire to thank all hon. Members of the House; the Opposition for the brevity of their speeches, and my hon. Friends behind me for the absence of theirs.

Question put, and agreed to.

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

EMERGENCY LAWS (MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS) ACT

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under section seven of the Emergency Laws (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1947, praying that the enactments specified in the Schedule hereto, which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one.

SCHEDULE

Section three of the Emergency Laws (Transitional Provisions) Act, 1946 (which as amended by section four of the Emergency Laws (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1947, extends certain emergency enactments relating to agriculture and land drainage),
Section six of the said Act of 1946 (which extends the Sugar Industry Act, 1942),
Section eight of the said Act of 1946 (which extends the war period for the purposes of the Restoration of Pre-War Trade Practices Act, 1942),
Section nine of the said Act of 1946 (which extends certain emergency enactments relating to legal powers)."—[Mr. Ede.]

10.48 p.m.

Mr. John Grimston: I do not think we ought to allow this Motion to go by without sounding a note of warning about Section 8 of the Act of 1946, which extends the war period for the purposes of the restoration of the Pre-war Trade Practices Act, 1942. That Act, as the House will recollect, was passed in the middle of the war in order to facilitate the production of armaments. Very rightly, the trade union movement was asked to give up a number of privileges which at the time it valued highly and for which it had fought for a long time. At that time it was a great thing that they agreed to give up these practices.
If hon. Members will look at the wording of the Act, two or three points will be seen which it would be well worth while to study. Indeed, if we cannot now come to some better arrangement, it will be a bad case of lack of leadership on both sides of industry. For example, let me first take the case of a trade union which gave up a practice in an existing firm and may now claim for that practice to be restored after the expiration of the period of time in the Act.
That is a fairly reasonable case which we can all understand. But any firm which has started since the beginning of the war can, under Section 1 (2) be made to apply restrictive practices to that new industry which had never applied to it before, but which may have applied to an analogous industry before the war. That means that every new firm which has grown up since the war may one day be faced with having to cut back its production and increase its costs for the utterly arbitrary reason that some similar firm in a similar industry once claimed to have applied that kind of restrictive practice before the war.
The next point is that under Section 8, the Act applies specifically to the following undertakings carried on by local authorities—gas, water, electricity, transport, and so on. All these undertakings either have been or are scheduled for nationalisation. Therefore, all the much-vaunted increase in productivity which the Government claim has taken place, and which is the aim of nationalisation, is under this Act, which is prolonged by this Prayer, to be put into the melting pot again and possibly subjected to a long


delaying process which, for the benefit of the House, I will describe briefly.
When the period of time for which this Prayer will operate expires, within two months practices operating in 1939 must be put into effect again and must be kept in effect for 18 months at least. Anyone with any experience of industry must know that after 11 years there will be endless argument about what was the practice in 1939. In the case of an industry which I know extremely well, I would hesitate to swear that such-and-such was done 11 years ago. By the time this Prayer expires, as it will be bound to do next year, the position will be even more difficult. Every year that this is kept in operation it will become more and more intolerable and more difficult to apply when the day comes.
I realise that it is not a regulation which could be allowed to lapse, and that the Act could be repealed without the fullest consideration by both sides of industry. I ask the Minister to use his powers to induce in both the employers and the trade union sides of industry an atmosphere which will get them away from the slump-mindedness which is behind this regulation. If we are to face all our economic difficulties successfully, we must get away from the 1939 mentality and adopt a 1950 one.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Isaacs): I am afraid that the hon. Member has not got in his mind the real terms and purposes of this regulation and how it has been operated. Restrictive practices are not prolonged by this Act. What in fact happened was that when war broke out there was an agreement between the parties that certain practices which could be held to restrict production should be suspended. The hon. Member said that there may have been an endless number of such arrangements made, and that in his own industry he could not say with honesty which were effective and which were not; but the fact is that they were recorded, and only those which were recorded come into effect. Therefore, there will be no bother over industry finding out what were the restrictive practices.
The second point is that, although this regulation may come to an end, those restrictive practices which were registered and recorded would not automatically

come into effect again. They can do so only if they are claimed by those who have given them up. From my knowledge of industry at the moment, and of the wonderfully good relationship existing, I have no fear about what is going to happen. At the present moment, both sides of an industry who have taken part in this arrangement are entitled at any time of the year to ask the Minister of Labour to bring before the House the necessary order taking them out of the regulation. They could have done that at any time. They have not done so and, as far as I can see, they have no intention of doing so. Therefore, we want this regulation continued so that these arrangements may continue between the parties in industry. We are in close touch with them, and meet them four times a year and these matters come up from time to time.
There is one other rather important point. There have been discussions on some possible amendment of the regulation to this effect, that the regulation applies to restrictive practices given up during the war period. But they have been giving up some of these so-called restrictive practices since the war ended, and these are not covered by the regulation, so it may be necessary to have this amendment. The main point, however, is that the industries could have asked for these to be removed; they have not done so, and it is their feeling that the regulation should be continued for the time being so that there shall be a fair balance between one section of the people and another.

Mr. J. Grimston: I realise very well that the restrictive practices were given up during the war; that was the sub stance of my argument; but the Minister tells us that restrictive practices given up after the war had ended do not count. I would point out to him that subsection (1) refers to any trade practices, and, further—

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman is making a second speech. He cannot do that, except by leave of the House.

Mr. Isaacs: It is on the second point to which the hon. Member referred on which the Amendment may be necessary. The point is that we do not want to cover post-war arrangements under war regulations.

Question put, and agreed to.

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

PATENTS

The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Harold Wilson): I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under subsection (3) of section forty-nine of the Patents Act, 1949, praying that the Patents (Extension of Period of Emergency) Order, 1950, be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 17th October.
The purpose of this Motion is to extend the period during which the Government can make use of patented inventions for the services of the Crown and associated Services without waiting for lengthy negotiations or agreement with the person or persons owning the patent. As the House knows, under Section 49 of the Patents Act 1949, the Government are given the power to make use of patents in this way, and the powers are particularly those which we have discussed earlier this evening.
The House is aware that, under Section 49, to which I have referred, where the Government take power over such patents, the patentee, or, where it applies, the exclusive licensee, can obtain use of these patents or; terms after the Government have taken them over, or, in default, on terms settled by a decision of the High Court. In practice, it is found that satisfactory terms have always been negotiated with the patentees or the exclusive licensees, but it is necessary that these powers be continued for a further period because they extend, as Section 49 makes clear, not only to defence production purposes, but also to purposes connected with the export drive, the maintenance of supplies and services, and the provision of machinery designed to increase our productivity in agriculture and industry, for the housing drive, and for other similar purposes. It is, therefore, desirable that these powers be extended for the further period, and I trust that the House will pass this Motion.

Question put, and agreed to.

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

REGISTERED DESIGNS

11.0 p.m.

Mr. H. Wilson: I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under sub-paragraph (3) of paragraph 4 of the First Schedule to the Registered Designs Act, 1949, praying that the Registered Designs (Extension of Period of Emergency) Order, 1950, be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 17th October.
I do not want to delay the House any longer. This Motion covers exactly the same kind of ground as that referred to in the Motion I have just moved, except that this is made, of course, under the Registered Designs Act and not under the Patents Act.

Question put, and agreed to.

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

SHOPS

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Geoffrey de Freitas): I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under subsection (1) of section seven of the Shops Act, 1950, praying that the provisions of that Act relating to general closing hours which have effect only as respects the winter months, being provisions which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one.
The provisions of the Shops Act, which it is proposed to continue in force, are those in Section 2, which did two things. First, they fixed the general closing hours for the winter months at 6 p.m., and 7.30 p.m. on the late day. Secondly, they gave power to the local authorities to substitute other hours no later than 7 p.m., and 8 p.m. on two late nights. If the provisions lapse, the winter closing hours would be 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. on the late dates. These provisions are admittedly stop-gap until amending legislation can be introduced to deal with the closing hours and bring them up to date.

Question put, and agreed to.

Address to be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

FOOD RATIONING

11.3 p.m.

Sir Herbert Williams: I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying that the Order, dated 6th September, 1950, entitled the Fats, Cheese and Tea (Rationing) (Amendment No. 3) Order, 1950 (S.I., 1950, No. 1482), a copy of which was laid before this House on 7th September, be annulled.
I do not think I need take very long about this. On the other hand, I think it is worth while that we should consider it for a few minutes. The title is the "Fats, Cheese, and Tea (Rationing) (Amendment No. 3) Order," but there is nothing in this Order about cheese, and tea, because they have been already cut down under other orders. This Order purports to amend two earlier orders this year, No. 796 and No. 1,071. As a matter of fact, it does not amend Order 1,071 at all. That deals only with definitions of cheese. What it does really amend is the Schedule to Order No. 796 which was laid before Parliament on 19th May and came into operation on 21st May and, in effect, deals only with butter.
Under the Order which came into operation on 21st May, we were allowed 6 oz. of butter at each odd number of ration week and 4 oz. at each even number of ration week, so that on the average we were entitled to 10 oz. every fortnight, or an average of 5 oz. a week. Under the Order which was made on 7th September, and came into operation on 10th September, we were cut down to 4 oz. of butter a week. In other words, this Order cut down our butter ration by 20 per cent. I think any cuts in the fats ration are open to grave criticism if they can be avoided. I am certain the hon. Member for Luton (Dr. Hill), who is an expert on matters of health, will bear me out when I say that one of the troubles of a great many people today is that they are eating too much of some kinds of food and not enough of others. There is a certain want of balance. Accordingly, any cut in the butter ration is a matter of grave anxiety to the general population.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food will no doubt say, "We have not got the butter. We have been into the figures and that is all we can spare." That is my criticism. I think that if the Ministry were abolished entirely, this kind of order would not be

necessary, as in respect of a great many food commodities in the world today there is not a state of shortage but a glut. It is only maladministration, a failure to seize opportunities, which imposes on us this cut in the butter ration.
The rationing of butter is one of the things which irritates housewives most—with the possible exception of tea rationing—and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will give us really substantial reasons why his Department are forced into making this proposal. It is no use us voting against this Order tonight, because that will not produce any more butter, but we can protest against the incompetence which makes this Order necessary. That is the burden of my point. I shall not give an analysis of the imports and exports of commodities from various countries, as it is my firm belief that the main thing is to have the Ministry of Food out of the way, for it is a purely obstructive institution serving no useful purpose; then we should not find it necessary to restrict the people's consumption of butter.

Mr. C. S. Taylor: I beg to second the Motion.
I do so formally because there are two other Motions on the Order Paper, and because my hon. Friend has moved this one so excellently.

11.8 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Mr. Frederick Willey): I am much obliged to the hon. Gentlemen for the brevity with which they have moved and seconded this Prayer. In view of the facts obtainable, I am not at all surprised because there is very little they can say. First, let me make it quite clear that when the ration was increased from 4 oz. to 5 oz. on 23rd April, it was made plain by my right hon. Friend that the increase was only a temporary one. It was explained by him that the increase was possible because of the good production in Australia and New Zealand, and because the season in Europe had begun very well. Now, as we had anticipated, the normal seasonal decline dictates a return to the 4 oz. ration.
As I have been asked to give substantial reasons why the ration has been reduced, may I briefly state the position in this country and the world? In this country, at present, home production of butter is 12,000 tons, which is less than


pre-war production, because we have given priority to the manufacture of cheese and baby foods. But this is not really of vital importance because, in fact, home production accounts for only 3 per cent. out of our total consumption. In fact, before the war it accounted for only 4 per cent.
Therefore, we have got to turn to the position affecting the import of butter. The three main supplies of butter to this country are from New Zealand, Denmark and Australia. We are dependent very largely upon the position obtaining in these countries. We are obtaining less than pre-war by way of imports. We are getting this year about 300,000 tons as against 340,000 tons pre-war. We are getting less butter from Holland and the Irish Republic for the reason that they have less available for export. Over and above that, there are certain countries—Sweden, Poland, the Baltic States and Russia—which are not at the moment exporting to us. So far as we are concerned—and this has nothing to do with the operations of the Ministry of Food—there is less butter available for export to this country.
What the Ministry of Food have done, and from which they claim credit, is to have encouraged the production of butter in these main producing countries. We have entered into long-term contracts with the Dominions, New Zealand and Australia to take the whole of their exportable surplus until 1955. In the case of Denmark, the other main supplier, we have undertaken to take 75 per cent. of their exportable surplus, or 115,000 lb., in any one year, which is the level of their pre-war exports to this country. We cannot persuade the Danes to export a larger proportion of their surplus to us, because the Danes very naturally want to preserve the other markets which they have for butter.
We can say that the effect of these long-term contracts has been to give a considerable measure of security to the producers and this has demonstrably increased production in those countries. So if the Ministry of Food have played any part, it has been in increasing production in the countries which supply us, and so has enabled us this year to increase the butter ration. If hon. Members think of the circumstances operating in the world today, they will realise what a stabilising

effect these long-term contracts are. Butter to the housewife in this country is subsidised to the extent of 1s. 0d. a lb., but if we disregard that and take the retail price unsubsidised as 3s. 0d. a lb., this compares most favourably with the 4s. 0d. and 5s. 0d. a lb., and even more, obtaining in Europe. We can say that we are obtaining butter at reasonable prices, and that the effect of the contracts we have made is to increase the supplies so that, instead of the 140 ounces the consumer obtained for each ration book up to 21st October, 1949, this year the consumer has obtained 188 ounces.

Question put, and negatived.

11.14 p.m.

Mr. C. S. Taylor: I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying that the Order, dated 18th October 1950, entitled the Bacon (Rationing) (Amendment No. 5) Order, 1950 (S.I., 1950, No. 1692), a copy of which was laid before this House on 19th October, be annulled.
I understand that it would be for the convenience of the House if we discussed together this Motion, and the Motion in the name of the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter), which deals with the Bacon (Control and Prices) (Amendment) Order. The object of the first Motion is to protest vigorously to the Minister of Food because the ration has now been reduced to 3 oz. The Minister of Food has played about so often with the bacon ration during the past few months it has become like a Stock Exchange security—one of the less reputable Stock Exchange securities. It varies up and down according to the gambles of the Minister of Food.
The history of bacon rationing since before the last election is rather interesting. Before the dissolution of the last Parliament, on 29th January, 1950, the public was given an increased ration of 5 oz. a week. That, of course, was at a time when various sops were being given to the public in view of what was going to come very shortly. It was not long after—in May, 1950, after the election—when the bacon ration was reduced to 4 oz. That was the Bacon (Rationing) (Amendment No. 2) Order. I do not know what happened to the Bacon (Rationing) (Amendment No. 1) Order; I cannot find any trace of it.

The Amendment No. 2 Order was introduced in Parliament in May. Certain


hon. Friends of mine and I put down a Prayer against this reduction, but before we were able to move it in the House, up went the ration again, under Amendment No. 3 Order. The hon. Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing) put his name to that Prayer, but he evidently did not know that the ration had been increased, because he was left carrying the baby. He was present in the House when the Prayer should have been moved, but when my hon. Friends and myself did not move it, the hon. Member for Hornchurch got up and made a protest. On that occasion, Mr. Speaker said that the Order which it was sought to pray against was dead, and, therefore, could not be prayed against.

Next we come to Amendment No. 4 Order, presented to Parliament on 4th October, which reduced the ration by 1 oz. back to 4 oz. We decided that we would oppose that reduction in the bacon ration, but before we could do anything, another order appeared—Amendment No. 5 Order—which reduced the ration by another ounce. That was laid before Parliament on 19th October. While this Order which we are praying against tonight was laid before Parliament on the 19th, no copies were in the Vote Office on the 20th, and I was able to get my copy only this morning.

After five and a half years of so-called peace we have this miserable ration of 3 oz., and a bacon ration at 3 oz. is as low as ever it was during the war. In fact, it went down to 3 oz. only once during the war, and that was in May, 1945. Of course, at that time we were not getting supplies from Denmark, nor from other European countries, and those supplies which were coming from Canada were subject to the dangers of U-boats. I believe I am right in saying that the only country in which bacon is rationed at the present time is this country.

Last spring I visited Austria, a former enemy country. If anyone visits Austria he will find there that shops are full of bacon and ham at reasonable prices. If one goes to France—and I admit the prices there are higher—one can get a ham sandwich at the railway station buffets, which is more than one can get here. Although in the past we complained about the ham sandwiches, how nice it would be to get one at a railway station buffet today.

I must say one word about home-produced bacon. The pig producer has been suffering under considerable difficulties. Now the Ministry of Food has told milk factories that they have to produce a lot more cheese, and obviously there is going to be a lot of whey available, either for pig food or for waste. It would be much better to use it for pig food than to waste it.

I suggest that the question of bacon is bound up with the extraction rate of flour. I believe I am right in saying that the present rate is 80 per cent.; if there were a reduction by 2½ per cent. in the rate, 28,000 tons more of pig food would be available to this country, or so it is estimated by the School of Agriculture at the University of Cambridge. I suggest that not only would a reduction in the extraction rate make our bread more palatable, though it might not be as nutritious in the opinions of the experts, but we might have a few more pigs.

It is not only pig producers who are suffering. At the beginning of the war 60 or 70 bacon factories were closed down by agreement. Although the trade tried hard to get these bacon factories returned to them in 1947 and 1948, permission was given to re-open them only in October, 1949. Obviously after that permission had been given, they needed a great deal of reconditioning, new machinery, repairs and replacements.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Gentleman is going very wide of this question. He has introduced a number of matters which are irrelevant under the Order.

Mr. Taylor: With the greatest of respect, what I am trying to show is why the bacon ration should not have been reduced from five to four ounces, and subsequently from four to three ounces, and I am trying to give the Government reasons why it should not be necessary. Had action been taken at the proper time, it would not have been necessary. In all these matters which I have mentioned, I feel the Government should accept full responsibility.
A matter which I think is relevant is the import of bacon from foreign countries. I am informed that the imports of bacon from Canada during January and February this year were almost as great as the total shipments from Canada in 1949. If that is correct, I should like


to know what have been the recent shipments from Canada. We do not know what is the present position, and we shall look forward to hearing it. The supplies from Denmark in the first three months of the year were three times those for the corresponding period in 1949. Can we also know what have been the shipments from Denmark for the past three months? Are we shipping on the same scale as for the first two months of the year? If not, why not?
As far as bacon is concerned, we have become the laughing-stock of Europe. After so many years after the war, and with all the benefits of a Socialist Government, we are the only country in the world with bacon rationing. I do not understand it. Wherever one goes, there seems to be plenty of pig meat. I do not believe that sufficient trouble has been taken to buy up small parcels of pig meat in Eire, Holland, Denmark and other pig-producing countries. I believe that if only a little more freedom had been given to private buyers, instead of the Ministry buying pig meat, we should have had a better deal.

Mr. Fernyhough: With French boiled ham at 10s. a lb?

Mr. Taylor: I am glad the hon. Member has said that. I wonder how much cutting down is due to the food subsidies. I wonder whether it is that the Ministry dare not give more bacon because the food subsidies are going up, and the new Chancellor of the Exchequer is going to be on the tail of the Minister for allowing too much to go to our people. Perhaps the Minister is worried about the bogus cost-of-living figures. Perhaps he thinks that the figures are going to rise. For all these reasons, I believe the housewife has cause to be irritated by these cuts—twice in a month. The 5 oz. ration was meagre enough, but now we are back again to 3 oz. If producers had been given proper encouragement from the Government, we should not have had to suffer this ridiculous cut in the bacon ration today.

11.29 p.m.

Sir H. Williams: I beg to second the Motion.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. C. S. Taylor) has stated the case with great force and lucidity. In a great many countries that have a Socialist

Government they have abolished bacon rationing. I wish to raise a matter of procedure. Order No. 4 was numbered 1925, and a Prayer was put down against it on Thursday. By chance, notice was given the same day of another Order. It is not fair that Members should be put in this embarrassing position. It means that the Order was out of date when it appeared on the Order Paper, because the very day that Order was handed in, this Order was also handed in.

Mr. C. S. Taylor: For the second time.

Sir H. Williams: Yes, for the second time. So while they are tabling one order, they are busy preparing the next. They do not seem to have any mental stability in that Department.
Then I want to protest against the Stationery Office. The Order handed in on 4th October was numbered 1925 and the one handed in on the 19th October was numbered 1692. One would assume that there was some proper serial method of numbering these things according to the date on which they were prepared, and any normal human being would think that 1692 preceded 1925. It is the duty of the Stationery Office, under the Statutory Instruments Act, to number, print and publish these documents. From the point of view of convenience of hon. Members and traders, there ought to be some coherence about the numbering of these orders. The Stationery Office ought to do their job more intelligently, because it is obvious that any hon. Member or any trader may be gravely deceived by taking the numbering as indicating the date.
I want to bring that out because from time to time we have had to protest against these things. There was the famous occasion during the war when the Fire Brigade Orders were never laid on the Table at all, and the Home Secretary, now the Lord President, had to come in a white sheet and apologise to the House. This is the same kind of offence in a different way, and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will pass on to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, who is concerned with the Stationery Office, that they ought to do their job more competently in future.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I understood from the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. C. S. Taylor) that he agreed to both Orders being discussed together.

Mr. Taylor: Yes, Sir, provided my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) is agreeable.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I agree to that.

11.33 p.m.

Mr. Turton: I want to add only one or two words to What was said extremely well by the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. C. S. Taylor). It is a complete confession of failure on the part of the Ministry of Food to reduce the bacon ration twice within a short time and I want to ask what justification there is for it. The home producer of bacon has been increasing his deliveries to the bacon factories throughout the summer. The 4th Tune returns for this year show that for pigs two months and under there was a 25 per cent. increase on the number in the previous year. Of course, the pigs going to the bacon factory in the succeeding three months will be coming from those pigs under two months in the last 4th June returns. That means there should be a 25 per cent. increase in home deliveries of bacon.
Looking at the import side, apart from the facts given by the hon. Member for Eastbourne, in July of this year the imports of bacon were a record for any of the years since the end of the war and our deliveries in July were exceptionally heavy. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary why he so staged his deliveries that he got this great increase in July instead of letting it be more graduated throughout the later months of the year? If he had been wise in his buying, as the private trader would have been wise, we would have had level deliveries of bacon from these countries throughout the summer months and the Autumn, and there would not have been this grave position at a time when the fresh meat ration is being cut the bacon ration being cut as well.
It is hard on the people of this country, who would prefer to have their bacon during the cold period of the year rather than during the Summer. The folly of the Ministry is that during the summer months they allowed the bacon ration to be reasonably good at 5 oz., and when the colder weather came they had to confess failure and to cut the ration to 3 oz.

I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will take this Order back and consult with the Minister to see whether it is necessary to cut the ration.
Turning to the other part of the Order, it is not right to try to ration by price. At the same time as he cuts the bacon ration, he puts up the price, and so adds to the cost of living. I believe that never before has a Minister of Food provided such a concurrent succession of failures as cutting the ration of butter, bacon and fresh meat and putting up the price.

11.36 p.m.

Mr. F. Willey: I understand that it is the wish of the House that I should reply on this Motion and also on the Motion in the name of the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) which deals with the Bacon (Control and Prices) (Amendment) Order together. On the first one, it is no good saying that we must not play about with the ration. I think the House has to make up its mind whether we should issue the bacon supplies we have in a fresh condition or whether we should store them. That is the simple issue. Our policy has been that when the supply permits we should avoid unnecessary accumulation and so avoid deterioration due to long storage, thus giving the housewife the benefit of fresh bacon. That is governed by the second consideration, that we have to maintain prudent stocks.
We have made this plain. We have discussed this with the trade and the trade has encouraged us. In fact, we agree that it is best, as our stocks rise, for the housewife to have the benefit of increased supplies. But if we do that we must have frequent adjustment of the ration if we are to maintain a stable stock throughout the year. When we increased the ration to 5 oz., we were holding unnecessarily high stocks.
Let me deal briefly with other points. Home production has been mentioned. As the hon. Member has said, it is much improved. The increased price and the quality premium, did result in an increased number of pigs going into the bacon factories. Whereas between the pre-war years, 1934 to 1938, the home production of bacon was 150,000 tons a year, this year we have reached 199,000 tons, an increase of one-third over the


pre-war production of bacon; so that at any rate we have made a substantial contribution to the increased bacon supplies available this year.
The position regarding imports is that supplies must be uncertain because we are dependent upon the exportable surpluses of other countries. The hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. C. S. Taylor) mentioned the war-time position. During the war we relied entirely upon dollar supplies. The only bacon imported into this country then was bacon from dollar countries. I do not think it is necessary for me to argue this evening the difficulties of obtaining bacon costing dollars. We have reduced to about one-tenth our supplies of bacon from dollar sources. The general position is that we can say that Denmark is on the way to supplying pre-war quantities, Holland is supplying about pre-war quantities, and Poland is supplying more than her pre-war quantity.
Canada has been mentioned. I have also mentioned the currency difficulties. But apart from these, the major difficulty regarding Canadian supplies is the heavy domestic demand. There is a considerable pressure of home demand for pig meat in Canada, which has made the export of bacon from that country not at all easy for the Canadian Government.

Sir H. Williams: Can the hon. Gentleman say how many ounces the Canadians have eaten this year?

Mr. Willey: No, not without notice, and that is not a question for me. I am dealing with the import of bacon into this country, and we have taken all the steps possible to give security to the producer by way of long-term contracts. We have undertaken, if the House needs reminding, to take 90 per cent. of the total exportable surplus from the Danes up to 1952, and in the case of Holland, we have an agreement lasting until 1952, whereby we take 25,000 to 30,000 tons this year and 35,000 tons in 1951, and 45,000 tons in 1952. That is a much larger total than the prewar exports to this country from Holland. We have long-term agreements to 1953 in the case of Poland and an agreement with the Irish Republic for the next few years.
Against this background, we Can say that we have taken every possible step to ensure that this country obtains the maximum supplies of bacon available in the world. We have already indicated

that the ration would be subject to seasonal decline. Recently, and surely this does not need much explanation to make it plain, the situation has deteriorated, particularly in Europe, and the seasonal decline, which was to be expected in any case, was worse because of the un-settlement in world affairs.

Mr. C. S. Taylor: The hon. Gentleman does not make himself clear. Have we exported from this country any pig-meat, or bacon, in any form?

Mr. Willey: Yes, we have exported 15 cwt. to the United States. This was of speciality ham, as a token export, to preserve that market. So the position regarding supply is that we have made substantial improvements in the supply of bacon to the housewife. I should like to give some comparative figures. First, the House must not forget that in January, 1949, the ration was one ounce a week, and from January to 21st October, whereas in 1949 the housewife had obtained 94 oz., by 21st October this year she had had 196 oz.—or rather more than double the amount of last year.

Mr. Taylor: What about the other four years?

Mr. Willey: I am dealing with last year, as compared with this. I was also asked to deal with the increase in the price of bacon. From what I have just said, it is quite clear that the subsidy on bacon must have increased this year, compared with last, because, if we consume more bacon, as we have, and bacon is a subsidised commodity, then the subsidy increased in amount. But that is not the sole reason, nor the principal reason, for the increase in the price of bacon.
We fixed the ceiling to the food subsidies at £410 million and we have made it plain again—it has been plain throughout the year—that whilst the ceiling to the subsidies was fixed, there would have to be constant adjustment of prices if prices of foodstuffs should increase. What has happened recently has been that we have had, as the House knows, the subsidies to assist the middle and inshore fishermen, the white fish subsidy. We have had increases on rail transport which became effective on 15th May. We have had higher transport costs since the increased Petrol Duty. We have also the increase on the flour subsidy following the increased extraction rate and the provision of whiter flour, and, as I have already


indicated, we have had the increased public consumption during the year of such subsidised foodstuffs as bacon, eggs, and milk.
All this has occurred against the international background and the unsettlement of world affairs following the Korean incident, when the general trend of world prices regarding foodstuffs has run against us. Ac I have already stressed, it has been an important factor in this situation that we have had the bulk contracts—the fixed prices contracts—to hold the prices of the major foodstuffs affecting the housewives of this country.
It was plain that some adjustment of price had to take place. We had to consider the various subsidised foodstuffs to determine where the price increase should alight. We decided upon butter and bacon, but I had better only deal with bacon, as this Order deals only with it. Bacon is a heavily subsidised foodstuff. The average retail price now is 2s. 7d. a lb.; without the subsidy it would be 3s. 6½d. a lb. We felt that if price adjustment had to be made, it should be made where the gap between the real price and the subsidised price was widest. We also knew from previous experience, having increased previously the price of bacon, that the increase in the price of bacon had not affected to any real degree the off-take of bacon. The full ration was still taken up. We were advised from a nutritional point of view that any loss in consumption of bacon was less detrimental than it might be in other foodstuffs, such as milk. Again, bacon is largely an imported foodstuff.
For these reasons we decided that the effect of the increase in price, which I have mentioned, should be borne by, in turn, increasing the retail price of bacon. That has meant an extra cost to the housewife of about ½d. a week on each ration book. It has meant an increase in the cost-of-living index by .18 per cent. It has led to no noticeable reduction in the consumption of the ration. I agree that is a difficult thing to test at the moment in view of the reduction in the ration. But having reviewed the position generally and bearing in mind the maintenance of the subsidies at £410 million, I am sure that is why the hon. Gentleman, the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) was willing to allow me to give an explanation

without making out the case himself. In view of these factors, we have taken the step any reasonable, prudent housewife would have us take. We have put the burden where it could best be borne and have maintained the subsidies at £410 million.

11.50 p.m.

Mr. Lennox-Boyd: I must congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary on the strange arguments that he has advanced to defend the policy of his Department. It is almost inconceivable that we could find the Korean war blamed for both the shortage of bacon and the increase in price. The fact is that we are witnessing the birth of a legend that the present Socialist Government, like its predecessors, has had responsibility without power.
We have learned also tonight a number of illuminating facts. My hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. C. S. Taylor) deserves every congratulation not only for raising this issue but for the competent manner in which he did it. I hope he will allow me to say that I have rarely heard a complicated issue put more clearly than he put it, and never has the muddling and mismanagement of the Department been more clearly shown in a short speech than in the remarks of my hon. and gallant Friend.
Among the interesting facts revealed by the Parliamentary Secretary is that we have seen more clearly than ever before that it is the food subsidies, with their inevitable fixed limit, that are largely responsible for the shortage of essential foodstuffs. We have also learned once more that the argument about the exportable surpluses from foreign countries, leaving out of account the price we are prepared to pay for them, are frequently called in aid by the Government to justify their own mismanagement. But the real point of my rising is to draw attention to the fact that the ration of bacon has been once more reduced, and the price has been increased, and although there are a number of Socialist Members in this House this evening, not a single one has risen to protest against this further hardship to the British housewife.

Question put, and negatived.

Motion made, and Question,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying that the Order, dated 30th August, 1950, entitled the Bacon (Control and


Prices) (Amendment) Order, 1950 (S.I., 1950, No. 1460), a copy of which was laid before this House on 1st September, be annulled."—[Mr. Boyd-Carpenter.]

put, and negatived.

STREET RESTORATION, HORNCHURCH

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. R. J. Taylor.]

11.53 p.m.

Mr. Bing: I am sorry to see that the majority of hon. Gentlemen opposite are going to leave the House because I am about to deal with a question raised at the Conservative Conference at Blackpool, the question of housing, of private house building as it affects my constituency, Hornchurch, and what is the concomitant—the roads of Hornchurch, which a large number of these private builders had promised to build and have failed to build. One cannot speak on the particular points I want the Minister to deal with, nor deal with the question of the roads of Hornchurch, without saying that the whole of my constituency is filled with unmade and unlighted roads.

Major Hicks-Beach: Can the hon. and learned Gentleman clear up one point? I understood him to say that the private builders promised to build roads in Hornchurch. Can he give us any details?

Mr. Bing: I am glad to find that one hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite does not know how private enterprise works. The private builders entered into agreements with the house purchaser that when the whole street was completed, and if the owner-occupier paid a certain sum, they would then complete the road.

Major Hicks-Beach: rose—

Mr. Bing: I will not give way. Then very often the builder failed to complete the road.

Major Hicks-Beach: I accept the fact that possibly private builders did enter into agreements, but surely the onus is on the tenant to make them complete the roads. As a member of a learned profession, I hope the hon. and learned Gentleman knows that the remedy lies with the tenants.

Mr. Bing: Provided the builder is not sensible enough, as practically all of them are, to form a private company with a capital of £100, fortuitously go bankrupt and wind up the company before meeting his obligations.

Major Hicks-Beach: The hon. and learned Gentleman is absolutely wrong.

Mr. Bing: That is the problem of the local authority in Hornchurch which is controlled by the Conservatives at the moment. It is faced with this legacy of private enterprise—streets unlighted. In one area of South Hornchurch we have many roads largely unlighted, possibly because if one had lights, they might, by shining on the water lying in the streets, lead astray ships on the Thames.
But the points I want to raise with the Minister of Transport deal, not with this general issue, but with two particular roads—the Southend road, and the road known as Lee Gardens. The Southend road is an historic link in my constituency, joining the old northern part to the southern part of the former parish. It is the most convenient way between the working-class half of the constituency and the other half; it is the only way people who live in the working-class part can reach the cinemas and general amenities; and it is the only way, incidentally, to the "Good Intent" public house, unfortunately tied premises but still one of the leading public houses of that area.
During the war this road was temporarily closed to prolong slightly the runway of the aerodrome. Since the end of the war that runway has no longer been in use, and it has been my custom every year to write to the Ministry in regard to the re-opening of the road. I will not burden the House at this late hour with reading the whole of the correspondence. I will start in 1948.

Major Hicks-Beach: Will the hon. and learned Gentleman give way again?

Mr. Bing: No.

Major Hicks-Beach: The hon. and learned Gentleman might get some facts.

Mr. Bing: In 1948 I had this reply from the Under-Secretary of State for Air:
I am so sorry you should have had to write again about the re-opening of the road across Hornchurch airfield.


I have made inquiries to see what has been holding things up, and I am told the station has been waiting for supplies of the wire fencing which is required to fence off the airfield before the road can be re-opened. Although you say there is plenty of fencing available on the station, it appears that Dannert wire was required for this particular purpose, and supplies of this wire had to be specially ordered. The wire was delivered to the station on Saturday, and instructions have been given that the fence is to be put up immediately. The job should be completed and the road opened in a matter of days now.
That was in September, 1948. In September. 1949, having written again to my right hon. Friend himself, he replied as follows:
You wrote to me again on 10th September about the restoration of the closed section of Southend Road, Hornchurch.
My engineers have only recently received from the County Surveyor preliminary details of the widening work, and there are several points yet to be cleared up, before the scheme can be finally agreed.
Should the County Council, for any reason, not be prepared to carry out the improvement work or if for financial reasons I find myself compelled to withhold grant towards its cost, I will certainly authorise the restoration of the road to proceed without further delay, but for the reasons stated above I do not want this to happen if it can be avoided.
I want to ask my right hon. Friend, first, if he will do something to place the responsibility for this delay. It is one of the few roads the neglect of which is not due to private enterprise.

Major Hicks-Beach: Will the hon. and learned Gentleman give way again?

Mr. Bing: No. Whose responsibility has been this long delay? Has it been the county council, has it been the urban district council, or has it been the Ministry? Let us first fix the responsibility for the delay. Next, there is now a promise, I understand—it being October, 1950—that this work is almost due to commence. My right hon. Friend will excuse me if, having had so many promises in the past that this is just about to happen, I ask for a really firm assurance from him now that something will be done.
I turn to Lee Gardens. This short piece of road, some 200 yards in length, is actually the property of my right hon. Friend's Ministry. It was bought by one of his predecessors with the idea of incorporating it in an arterial road. Then

it was decided not to construct the arterial road. Unfortunately, it remains the only entry to a large working-class estate.

Major Hicks-Beach: On a point of order. I understood from the opening of the hon. Member's speech that he criticised the administration of private builders in Hornchurch. Now he appears to be directing his argument entirely against the Ministry of Transport.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: No point of order arises.

Mr. Bing: I regret, and I think everybody else in the House regrets, that when one is trying to deal with a serious point of view in the ordinary lives of the ordinary people in one's constituency, Conservative and Labour alike, one should be subjected in the short time one has to facetious observations from the benches opposite.
Now, if the House will allow me to continue, this road, as my right hon. Friend well knows, because we have had a great deal of correspondence on this, is the property of his Ministry. It is the only entry to a large estate. It is in an appalling state—three and four inches deep in mud, no surface on the road—and it is impossible for any vehicle to enter the estate. While the inhabitants have paid for a comparatively narrow footway, vehicles have been allowed to drive over it and that has broken it down. A new school is to be situated off this road. This is the Hornchurch County High School, which is the responsibility of the Essex County Council. It is of great importance to the people living there that we should have some determination of who is responsible and that some action should be taken as soon as possible. I should like to read to the House the various letters I have had from my right hon. Friend's late Parliamentary Secretary, now the Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty. He wrote on 9th November, 1949:
You wrote to me again on 5th October about Lee Gardens, Hornchurch. When the County Surveyor took up the question of the link road between A.127 and A.13 "—
two trunk roads both running to Southend—
—incorporating Lee Gardens—with our Divisional Road Engineer in 1948, we asked the County Surveyor to give a full justification of the proposal on traffic grounds and to let us know his Council's views on it.


We are still waiting for the Surveyor's submission, and as soon as we receive it we will examine it without delay. Until then, there is nothing we can do. We have recently asked the County Surveyor to speed up his report.
Thus according to my right hon. Friend's Ministry the fault lies with the county surveyor who had not sent in his report. But the Urban District Council of Horn-church wrote me on 22nd November, 1949, quoting from a letter of 8th August, 1947—three years ago from now—which they received from the Clerk of the County Council:
I have to inform you that this scheme has been submitted to the Divisional Road Engineer, Ministry of Transport, for approval in principle, and the Ministry's reply is at present awaited.
So that, on one hand, the Ministry are saying they are waiting to hear from the County Council and the County Council are saying they are waiting to hear from the Ministry.
Finally, I circulated the correspondence generally to the Council. On 25th January, 1950, the Council replied to me in part as follows:
This Council have made representations to the Ministry from time to time in the hope of obtaining their assistance towards securing an amelioration in the condition of Lee Gardens Avenue, but the Ministry are not prepared to meet the cost of even temporary repairs. The Ministry refuse to accept any liability in respect of the road and, in doing so, refer to the provision contained in the contract under which they purchased the land forming the site of the road, that the vendors should, at their expense, be at liberty, at any time before the commencement of the construction of the approach road, to construct a temporary road on the land. This council is not prepared to enter into negotiations for the acquisition of the land forming the site of the road, unless and until the scheme incorporating the site of the road is approved in principle by the Ministry.
I want to make this appeal to my right hon. Friend. Every day that this road is left in its present condition, and there is a failure of these three authorities to get together, people are suffering in health, inconvenience and in the initiative with which they approach their work because they have to live under these miserable conditions. Therefore, I ask that these two roads should be restored and reopened. They are only some 350 yards in length. It is not a terrible task in either case to secure the construction of a such small length of road. In their physical distance these roads are very short, but if one measures them in terms

of human discomfort, suffering, frustration and ill-health, they reach from Horn-church to Westminster.

12.6 a.m.

Major Hicks-Beach: I do not propose to deal with the criticism the hon. and learned Member for Horn-church (Mr. Bing) has levelled against the Ministry of Transport. I should like to deal with his opening remarks, in which he sought to blame private enterprise. The hon. Member is a member of the legal profession, and he knows full well that if there is any sort of trouble with a private builder, it is up to these people to deal with the builder. If the hon. Member does not know, I will try to explain the position to him. The answer is to wind up the company and enforce your rights. It is bringing in party politics to try to lay the blame on private enterprise in a Debate which should be confined to a local problem. I hope that the protest I have made will be brought to the attention of the hon. and learned Member's constituents.

12.7 a.m.

The Minister of Transport (Mr. Barnes): I acknowledge at once the generous way in which my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Horn-church (Mr. Bing) has raised this matter. I confess that I fully appreciate the reason why he has raised this matter on the Adjournment, on looking through the correspondence and history of the case. In the circumstances prevailing, as my hon. and learned Friend rightly said, the people living in the surrounding estates are suffering from this state of affairs.
I will deal with the Southend Road first. I hoped, at one period, that it would be possible to make a really good job of the restoration. I do not question any of the correspondence I have had with my hon. and learned Friend, which he accurately quoted. One thing that was very clear when this matter first came before us was that the Government had entire responsibility for the restoration in connection with the war damage claim, this road having been closed by the R.A.F. for war purposes.
On examination of the problem, it occurred to me, from the report of my engineers, that it was desirable, when the money was spent, to make the job complete by widening the road at the same time. In my correspondence with my


hon. and learned Friend I mentioned that fact, but I hope it was also noted that I put in a proviso to the effect that it would be done if financial circumstances permitted. Unfortunately, in the intervening period the financial circumstances of the Ministry of Transport became so severely restricted that today it is not possible to undertake new reconstruction work. In fact, there is hardly sufficient capital to keep open vital lines of communication.
No one regrets more than I do that in the later stages I had, against my better judgment, to fall back on the limited Government liability, namely, that at this stage we could only spare funds necessary to carry out restoration. Last month I authorised that work to proceed and, as far as I know, there is nothing to prevent the restoration of the damage to the Southend Road.
I hope my hon. and learned Friend will not press me to pin down liabilities in this matter. It is hardly for me to comment on the actions of either the County Council or the Urban District Council. In this instance I have endeavoured to state my own Departmental position clearly. As I say, I regret the fact that we cannot now provide funds for the widening of the Southend Road, but the authorisation to complete the restoration process has been given and, as far as I know, there is no reason why it should not proceed.
With regard to Lee Gardens Avenue, Hornchurch, this, too, in some respects is an unfortunate state of affairs. It arises from time to time in the acquisition of land for large schemes. In this case the Dartford and Purfleet Tunnel Scheme is an exceedingly large, important and expensive project, which, because of the necessity to restrict capital investment, has had to be stopped. As often happens in large schemes of this kind, other matters intervene. In this case the lines of the approach road, which were determined many years ago, were subsequently altered, and the Ministry of Transport found itself with this particular stretch of land which it no longer required.
Of course, the best solution would be for the land to be acquired by the Horn-church Urban District Council. The problem that my hon. and learned Friend raises now is particularly difficult

for me because the Ministry of Transport cannot possibly begin to undertake any responsibility for local roads. What we have done in all our negotiations and discussions with the Hornchurch Urban District Council is to make it quite plain that we shall place no obstacles in the way, but will provide every facility of access to enable the adjoining properties to get their outlet.
Of course, we, as a Ministry, cannot undertake any cost in this respect. The Hornchurch Council has been asked to put this road into good condition, but so far it has not done so. I do not exactly know the way out of this difficulty. I will undertake to read very carefully what my hon. and learned Friend has stated. I shall be able to see copies of the correspondence to which he has referred. I will see if it is possible to get my divisional road engineer and the other authorities together to see whether there is a way out of this difficulty.
I do not see how I can go back on the main problem which I have to face, which is that I cannot find the funds for any substantial alteration, but I am, I think, entitled to say that, taking into account the Hornchurch Urban District Council and its relationship to the various projects it puts before the Government, I am sympathetic. I appreciate the difficulties of the area, with which I have been familiar all my life. I know how rapidly it developed between the wars. But if one takes the overall attitude of the Government to the proposals and projects of the Hornchurch District Council, I think it will be seen that it has not been treated ungenerously.
On this question of the local roads, and on this one in particular, without committing myself tonight or attempting to assess any blame, I will say that I do appreciate the main point made by the hon. and learned Member. While the three bodies—the Ministry, the County Council and the Urban District Council—are unable to come to agreement on this matter, his constituents are suffering inconvenience. Therefore, I will undertake again to look personally into this matter and see whether I can bring the parties together to try to find a way out of the difficulty. In my view, probably the best way would be for the Urban District Council to acquire this land from the Ministry of Transport. Then they would


have the complete right to do what is necessary. As far as we are concerned, whether with regard to facilities for tenants to get access to the main road or whether it is a matter for the Urban District Council to construct the roads, we shall give them every facility we can.

Mr. Bing: One of the difficulties of the Urban District Council is, I understand, that their view of the type of road which they should construct will depend on whether or not there can be approval by the Ministry of this particular stretch of road being made part of a projected through road.

Mr. Barnes: I will look into that aspect. That raises the financial issue which I mentioned. We will leave it at that for tonight.

Major Hicks-Beach: Does the Minister agree with the allegations of the hon.

and learned Member for Hornchurch regarding the difficulties—that they are in any way to be attributed to the private builder, as he suggested in his opening remarks?

Mr. Barnes: I will not enter into a controversy of that kind. All I am concerned with at the moment is to find out where my Department comes into the matter and the history of this thing. From my knowledge of the way this area has developed, I would say that if I went into it more thoroughly, I would probably end up on the side of my hon. and learned Friend rather than on the hon. and gallant Member's side.

Question put, and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty Minutes past Twelve o'clock.